superior to all the generations that have gone before it-improving the soil, adorning the landscape, promoting the progress of the useful arts, enlarging the boundaries of science, diffusing the blessings of Christianity over the globe, giving an impulse to every philanthropic movement, counteracting the spirit of war, ambition, and licentiousness, cultivating peace and friendly correspondence with surrounding nations, and forming an impregnable bul wark around every government where the throne is established in truth and in righteousness.

To state and illustrate the various means by which a more extensive diffusion of knowledge may be effected, and the general improvement of society promoted, is the main object of the following pages, in which the state of education in our country, and the principles on which it ought to be conducted, shall occupy our first, and our chief attention.

PART I.

ON EDUCATION.

PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

to achieved, man may still accomplish. If minds once feeble and benighted, and ignorant as the wild ass's colt, have, by proper training, been raised near the highest pitch of moral and intellectual attainments, other minds, by similar training, may be elevated to the same degree of perfection. If nations, once rude and ignorant, as the Britons formerly were, have been raised to a state of civilization and refinement, and excited to cultivate the arts and sciences, the same means by which this object was accomplished may still be employed in other cases to produce the same effect. If several portions, however small, of any civilized community, have been brought to a high state of intellectual improvement, it is evident, that the greater part, if not the whole, may be advanced into a similar state. It only requires that the means of instruction be simplified and extended, and brought within the reach of every one whose faculties are capable of cultivation. That this object has never yet been effected, is not owing to its im practicability, or to any insuperable obstacles which lie in the way of its accomplishment; but because the attention of mankind has never yet been thoroughly directed to it; and because the means requisite for promoting it have never been employed on a scale proportionate to the extent and magnitude of the enterprise. The influential classes of society in every country, have been more absorbed in the pursuits of avarice, ambition, war, devastation, and THERE is, perhaps, nothing of more importance to sensual gratifications, than in meliorating the phy- the human race, and which has a more direct bearsical and moral condition of their species. The ing on the happiness of all ranks, than the cultiva tenth part of the treasures which have been wastedtion of the mental faculties, and the acquisition of in the prosecution of such mad and immoral pur-substantial knowledge. Whether we consider man suits, had it been properly directed, would have been as a transitory inhabitant of this lower world, or as more than sufficient to have brought the means of in a state of progression to another region of exis instruction within the reach of every individual of ence-it is of the utmost importance, that he be the human race, and to have transformed the bar- thoroughly acquainted with the Great Author of his ren wastes of every country into the appearance of existence, with the general structure of the universe a terrestrial paradise. There is no government un-in which he is placed, with the relations in which he der heaven, so far as we are acquainted (if Prussia stands to his fellow-men, and the other beings which and the United States of America he not excepted) surround him, with the duties he ought to discharge where the instruction of the great mass of the people to his Creator, and to his own species, with the naforms a prominent and specific object in its admi- ture of that eternal world to which he is destined, nistration. On the contrary, in several instances, and with that train of action and of contemplation even within the limits of Europe, it is well known, which will prepare him for the enjoyments of a futhat the intellectual instruction of the lower orders ture and eternal state. All the other objects which is prohibited by law. Even in Great Britain, where can employ the attention of the human mind mus the light of science shines with peculiar effulgence, evidently be viewed as in some degree subordinate the exertions of philanthropists have been damped to these. For, on the acquisition of the knowledge in their attempts to diffuse knowledge among the to which we allude, and the corresponding course people; heavy taxes have been imposed on the means of conduct to which it leads, depends the happiness of its diffusion; men of knowledge have been perse- of man, considered both as an individual, and as a cured and neglected, while men devoted to war and member of the great family to which he belongsbloodshed have been loaded with wealth, and ex- his happiness both in the present life, and in the life alted to the highest stations of dignity and honor; to come. no national scheme supported by the state, has ever yet been devised for its universal propagation among all ranks, and no sums set apart for this purpose, while the treasures of the nation have been wasted in extravagance, and, in too many instances, devoted to the support of vice, tyranny, and intolerance. But we trust that the breath of a new spirit is now beginning to animate the councils of the nation and the great body of the people; and when the means within our power of extending the blessings of knowledge shall be employed with energy and judgment, we may expect, ere long, to behold a generation rising up, in intelligence and moral action,

Nothing, however, appears to have been more overlooked, in the general arrangements of society, than the selection of the most proper means by which such important ends are to be accomplished. In those nations and societies which, in their progress from barbarity, have arrived at only a half-civilized state, the acquisition of the means of subsistence, and of those comforts which promote their sensitive enjoyment, forms almost an exclusive object of pursuit; and it is not before they have arrived at a certain stage of civilization, that moral and intellectual improvement becomes an object of general attention. And, even in those nations which have advanced farthest in the path of science and of social refine* For example: A roval Sardinian edict, pub-ment, the cultivation of the human mind and the lished in 1825, enjoins, "that henceforth no person shall learn to read or write who cannot prove the possession of property above the value of 1500 livres," or about £62 10s. sterling. And it is well known, that the greater part of the lower classes in Russia, Austria, and Poland are, from their situation, debarred from the benefits of instruction.

details of education are not considered in that serious light which their importance demands. Almost every thing else is attempted to be accurately adjusted, while the moral and intellectual improvement of the mass of the community is left either to the direction of chance, or to the injudicious schemes of weak and ignorant minds. Every one who has

acquired a smattering of English grammar and arithmetic, and who can write his own name, conceives that he is qualified to conduct the intellectual improvement of the young; the most illiterate and superficial pedants have intruded themselves into the office of teachers; those who have never had the least experience in the art of teaching, nor have studied its principles, have assumed the prerogative of dictating the arrangements and discipline of a school; and hence, the office of a teacher of youth, which is one of the most important and respectable in the social system, has frequently been considered as connected with the meanest talents, and with the lowest gradations in society.

obtained a good education, rising up in life, in a state of ignorance and vice, in consequence of the superficial and injudicious modes by which they have been tutored, and which prevent them from profiting by the instructions of the ministers of religion.

While the great body of mankind must necessarily be engaged in manual employments, and while it is essential to their happiness, as well as to their bodily subsistence, that a portion of their time be thus employed,—it would be a highly desirable object to induce upon their minds a taste for intellectual pursuits, and for those pure enjoyments which flow from a contemplation of the works and provi Great Britain has long held a distinguished rank dence of the Creator, and of those moral laws and among the nations of Europe in the scale of science arrangements which he has ordained for promoting and of civilization, and on account of the numerous the social order and the eternal happiness of manseminaries of instruction which have been establish- kind, in which those hours not devoted to worldly ed in every quarter of the island. Excepting Prussia, business might be occasionally employed. As man the United States of America, and the mountains is a being compounded of a corporeal organized and vales of Switzerland, there are few countries structure, and a system of intellectual powers, it in which education is more generally appreciated evidently appears to have been the intention of the and more widely diffused than in the Northern dis- Creator, that he should be frequently employed both trict of Great Britain; and the effects produced by in action and in contemplation. But when his phyour literary and scholastic establishments are appa-sical powers only are set in motion, and the princirent in the desire for knowledge, and the superior pal object of his activity is to supply the wants of intelligence which characterize the different ranks his animal frame, he can be considered as little suof our population. When we compare ourselves perior to the lower orders of animated existence, in this respect with the Russian boors, the Lapland- and must, in a great measure, frustrate the end of ers, the Calmucs, the Cossacks, or the Tartars, or his Creator in bestowing upon him the faculties of even with the inhabitants of Naples, of Spain, or his rational nature. of Portugal, we seem to stand on an eminence to In order to raise mankind from the state of menwhich they can scarcely hope to approach for a tal darkness and moral degradation into which they lapse of ages. On the other hand, when we com- have fallen it is essentially requisite, that the utpare ourselves with what we ought to be, as beings most care be bestowed on the proper direction of the possessed of rational natures, and destined to im- youthful mind, in its first excusions in the physical mortality, and as surrounded with the light of sci- and moral world; for when it has proceeded a cerence and of revelation,—we shall find, that we are, tain length, amidst the mists of ignorance and the as yet, but little more than just emerging from the devious ways of vice, it is extremely difficult, if not gloom of moral depravity and mental darkness.-impossible, to recall it from its wanderings to the When we consider the mass of depravity which is path of wisdom and felicity. Instructions, not still hovering around us, the deplorable ignorance, merely in reference to sounds and accents, and acthe superstitious notions, the false conceptions in curate pronunciation, but also in relation to imporregard to many important truths, the evil passions, tant facts, and the various properties and relations and the grovelling affections which so generally pre-of objects around them, must be communicated at vail, we must acknowledge, that much, much indeed, an early age; and not merely the names, but the remains to be accomplished, before the great body ideas, of the most interesting objects in the physical of the people be thoroughly enlightened in the and intellectual world, must be conveyed by a sucknowledge of all those subjects in which they are cession of well-defined mental imagery, and sensiinterested, as rational, accountable, and immortal ble illustrations, so as to arrest and impress the jubeings, and before they can be induced to give a de- venile mind, and excite its energies and affections cided preference to moral pursuits and intellectual in the pursuit of knowledge and virtue. Without pleasures. And, if this is the case in a nation de- an attention to this important object, the business signated civilized and enlightened, how thick must of elementary instruction appears to regard man be the darkness which broods over the inhabitants rather as a mere machine than as a rational and of other regions of the globe, how deep the moral immortal being, and seems to be little short of an debasement into which they are sunk, and how insult offered to the human understanding. The many vigorous efforts must be requisite, ere they ultimate object of all scholastic instruction ought can be raised to the true dignity of moral and in- undoubtedly to be, to convey to youthful minds subtellectual agents! If ever this important object is stantial knowledge, to lead them gradually into a to be accomplished-which the predictions of an- view of the nature and qualities of the objects with cient prophecy leave us little room to doubt-it is which they are surrounded, of the general appearnow high time that we arouse ourselves from our ances, motions, and machinery of external nature, slumbers, and engage with increased activity and of the moral relations in which they stand to the zeal in the work of reformation and of rational in- Great Author of their existence, and to one another, struction. Let us not imagine, that the preaching of and of the various duties which flow from these rethe gospel, in the dull and formal manner by which lations,-to direct their affections, tempers, and pasit is at present characterized, will effectuate this sions, in such a channel as will tend to promote great object, without the use of all the efficient means their own comfort, and the harmony of general soof juvenile instruction we can devise. While we ciety, and to prepare them for the nobler employ. boast of the privileges of our favored land, of the ments of an immortal existence. Such moral and blessings of Divine Revelation, and of the enlight- intellectual instructions ought to go hand in hand ened era in which we live; and while we are en- with the acquisition of the various combinations of deavoring to impart to distant nations the blessings sounds and syllables, and with the mechanical exof science and of the Christian religion;-let us ercises of writing and cyphering; otherwise the not forget, that there are thousands of the young beneficial consequences, which should result from generation around us under the show of having instruction in the common branches of education,

will be few and unimportant. Whether the pre- thirty thousand students in the university of Oxford. vailing modes of education in this country be cal- But the education of the middling and lower classes culated to promote the ends now stated, will appear, of society. was still miserably neglected. Even when we come to investigate the range of our ele- in those countries which have since been distinmentary instruction, and the circumstances con- guished for scholastic establishments, a universal nected with the manner of its communication. Be-apathy seems to have prevailed, in regard to the acfore proceeding to this investigation, I shall take a rapid view of the present state of education in different civilized nations.

CHAPTER I.

PRESENT STATE OF EDUCATION IN DIFFERENT
COUNTRIES.

quisition of knowledge, and of the first elements of education. In the year 1494, a few years before Luther began to assail the Romish Church, it was enacted by the Parliament of Scotland, "that all barons and substantial freeholders throughout the realin should send their children to school, from the age of six to nine years, and then to other seminaries, to be instructed in the laws, that the country might be possessed of persons properly qualified to discharge the duties of sheriffs, and other civil offces." Those who neglected to comply with the provisions of this statute, were subjected to a penalty of twenty pounds Scots. This enactment evidently implies, that even the influential classes of society, at that period, paid little attention to the education even of the male branches of their families, and, of course, that those in the lowest ranks must have been generally, if not altogether deprived of this inestimable privilege. It was only after the passing of this act, as Dr. Henry remarks, that several individuals began to be distinguished for their classical acquirements, and that learning was much more generally diffused throughout the country.

FOR a long period, even after the introduction of Christianity among the nations of Europe, the education of the young seems to have been in a great measure neglected. The records of history afford us no details of any particular arrangements that were made either by the church or the state for promoting this important object. During the long reign of Papal superstition and tyranny, which lasted for nearly a thousand years, the instruction of the young appears to have been entirely set aside, or, at least, to have formed no prominent object of attention.The common people grew up, from infancy to manhood, ignorant of the most important subjects, having their understandings darkened by superstition, their moral powers perverted, and their rational faculties bewildered and degraded, by an implicit submission to the foolish ceremonies and absurdities inculcated by their ecclesiastical dictators; and even many in the higher ranks of life, distinguished for their wealth and influence in society, were so untutored in the first elements of learning, that they could neither read nor write. Ignorance was one of the foundations on which the splendor and tyranny of the Romish hierarchy were built, and therefore it would have been contrary to its policy, and the schemes it had formed of universal domination, to have concerted any measures for the diffusion of knowledge and the enlightening of mankind.We read of no nation or community, during the dark ages, that devised plans for the rational and religious instruction of youth, excepting a poor, op--although they are still miserably deficient both in pressed, and despised people, " of whom the world was not worthy"—the pious and intelligent, but persecuted Waldenses. It appears that a system of instruction prevailed among these inhabitants of the valleys of Piedmont, seven hundred years ago, more rational and efficient than has yet been established in the British Isles.

It was not till the era of the Reformation that seminaries for the instruction of the young began to be organized and permanently established. Prior to this period, indeed, colleges and universities had been founded in most of the countries of Christendom; but the instructions communicated in those seats of learning were chiefly confined to the priestly order, and to the sons of the nobility who aspired after the highest and most lucrative offices under the hierarchy of Rome. Their influence was scarcely felt by the mass of the people; and the origin of the earliest of these seminaries cannot be traced much beyond the beginning of the thirteenth century. These new establishments, however, with the academical honors they conferred on proficients in knowledge, gave a powerful impulse to the study of science, and greatly increased the number of those who devoted themselves to the pursuits of learning. It is said, that, in the year 1262, there were no less than ten thousand students in the university of Bologna, although Law was the only science taught in it at that time; and that in the year 1340, there were

At the time of the revival of learning, soon after the reformation, a new impulse was given to the human mind, a bold spirit of inquiry was excited in the laity, when the vices of the Romish clergy were exposed, and their impositions detected; the absurdity of many tenets and practices authorized by the church was discovered; the futility of the arguments by which illiterate monks attempted to defend them was perceived; the mystic theology of the schools was set aside, as a system equally unedifying and obscure; the study of ancient literature was revived; the attention was directed to the sacred Scriptures, as the only standard of religious truth, the legen dary tales of monkish superstition were discarded, a taste for useful knowledge was induced,—and from that period, seminaries for the instruction and improvement of the juvenile mind, began to be gradually established in many of the countries of Europe;

point of number, and in the range of instruction which they profess to communicate. The following is a brief view of the present state of education in various countries :—

United States of America.-Although the system of education has never yet arrived nearly at perfec tion, in any nation, yet the inhabitants of the United States may be considered, on the whole, as the best educated people in the world. With a degree of liberality and intelligence which reflects the highest honor on their character, they have made the most ample provision for the elementary instruction of all classes; and most of their arrangements, in reference to this object, appear to be dictated by disinterested benevolence, and by liberal and enlarged views of what is requisite to promote the moral improvement of society. In the New States, one square mile in every township, or one thirty-sixth part of all the lands, has been devoted to the support of common schools, besides seven entire townships for the endowment of larger seminaries. In the older States, grants of land have frequently been made for the same purposes; but in New England all sorts of property are assessed for the support of the primary schools, which are established in every township.The following extract from a speech of Mr. Webster, a distinguished member of Congress, in a convention held at Massachusetts in 1821, displays the principles and practical operation of this system,

and the grand design it is intended to accomplish: navigation, geography, history, logic, political eco-"For the purpose of public instruction," said this nomy, rhetoric, moral and natural philosophy.illustrious senator, 66 we hold every man subject to These schools being, as stated in the printed regulataxation in proportion to his property; and we look tions, intended to occupy the young people from the not to the question, whether he himself have or have age of four to seventeen, and to form a system of not children to be benefited by the education for education, advancing from the lowest to the highest which he pays; we regard it as a wise and liberal degree of improvement which can be derived from system of police, by which property and life, and the any literary seminaries inferior to colleges and unipeace of society, are secured. We hope to excite aversities, and to afford a practical and theoretical feeling of respectability, and a sense of character, acquaintance with the various branches of useful by enlarging the capacities and increasing the education. There are at present in Boston, 68 free sphere of intellectual enjoyment. By general in- schools, besides 23 Sabbath schools, in all of which struction, we seek, so far as possible, to purify the the poorest inhabitant of Boston may have his childmoral atmosphere; to keep good sentiments upper-ren educated, according to the system of education most, and to turn the strong current of feeling and now specified, from the age of four to seventeen, opinion, as well as the censures of law, and the de- without any expense whatever. The children of nunciations of religion, against immorality and both sexes are freely admitted. The funds of those crime. We hope for a security beyond the law and schools are derived from funds and bequests from above the law, in the prevalence of enlightened and individuals, and grants from the legislature and corwell-principled moral sentiment. We hope to con-porations; and enable the trustees, consisting of tinue and to prolong the time, when, in the villages twelve citizens elected by the inhabitants of each of and farm-houses of New England, there may be the twelve wards of the city, with the mayor and undisturbed sleep within unbarred doors. We do eight aldermen, to give the teachers' salaries, varynot indeed expect all men to be philosophers or ing from 2500 to 800 dollars a year. The assistant statesmen; but we confidently trust, that by the dif- teachers have 600 dollars. The trustees elect their fusion of general knowledge and good and virtuous teachers, and vote their salaries yearly, and no presentiments, the political fabric may be secure, as ference is giver, on any principles but those of merit well against open violence and overthrow, as or skill. No expense whatever is incurred in these against the slow but sure undermining of licentious- schools for the children, except in books. The ness. We rejoice that every man in this commu- richer classes in Boston formerly very generally nity may call all property his own, so far as he has patronized teachers of private schools, who were occasion for it to furnish for himself and his child-paid in the usual way; but they now find that the ren the blessings of religious instruction, and the ele-best teachers are at the head of the public schools, ments of knowledge. This celestial and this earthly and in most cases prefer them-the children of the light he is entitled to by the fundamental laws. It highest and lowest rank enjoying the privilege, altois every poor man's undoubted birthright-it is the gether invaluable in a free state, of being educated great blessing which this constitution has secured to together. him-it is his solace in life-and it may well be his "In the adjoining State of Connecticut, it has been consolation in death, that his country stands pledg-ascertained by actual reports, that one-third of the ed, by the faith which it has plighted to all its citi-population of about 275,000, attend the free schools. zens, to protect his children from ignorance, barbarity, and vice."

The result of the recent inquiry into the state of education in the State of New York, which adjoins These are noble sentiments and views, worthy of New England, and is almost equal to it in populabeing adopted and reduced to practice by every go- tion, is very much, though not entirely the same.vernment under heaven; and we trust the period is It is proved by actual reports, that 499,434 children, not far distant when the British senate, and every out of a population of 1,900,000, were at the same other legislative assembly in Europe, shall have time attending the schools, that is, a fourth part of their attention directed to the arrangement of a sys- the whole population. Although the public funds of tem of universal education, on an expansive and li- New York State are great, these schools are not enberal scale, and with such generous and disinterest-tirely free; but free to all who apply for immunity ed objects in view.

There are no States in the Union, nor perhaps in any country in the world, so amply provided with the means of instruction, as the States of New York and New England. In New York, in 1829, there were no less than 8609 common schools, affording education to 468,205 young persons, which was rather more than a fourth part of the entire population! and it is probable, that, since that period, the number has considerably increased. In Scotland, which is reckoned one of the best educated countries in Europe, it is found, that only one in eleven, out of the entire population, has the benefit of education. -In New England, free schools have been endowed by benefactions from different individuals, and the funds thus bequeathed by charity, or public spirit, have not been devoured by the cormorants of a grasping oligarchy, but prudently and carefully administered. The education given at these schools, too, is vastly superior to what is obtained at our parish schools. The general plan of education at the public free schools here," says Mr. Stuart, "is not confined to mere reading, writing, arithmetic and book-keeping, and the ancient and modern languages, but comprehends grammar, mathematics,

"Three Years' Residence in North America."

from payment. The amount of the money paid to the teachers, by private persons, does not, however, amount to one-third of the whole annual expense, which is somewhat less than a million of dollars."

Besides the seminaries appropriated to the instruction of the mass of the population, the United States contain no less than seventy colleges, in which the ancient and modern languages, the mathematical sciences, Natural Philosophy, Chemistry, Logic, Christian Theology, and other branches, are regularly taught, as in the European universities; but with more attention to the moral and religious conduct of the students. About the time of the American Revolution, in 1775, there were 10 colleges; from 1775 to 1800, 13 were established; from 1800 to 1814, 11 were added; and from 1814 to 1834, no less than 36 colleges have been established. In these colleges, 5500 students are prosecuting their education, in the different departments of Literature and Science.-The American Education Society is just now educating 912 young men for the ministry; the Presbyterian Education Society has 612 students under its charge; the Northern Baptist Society has 250. The whole number at present educated by these Societies, including the Episcopalian, German, Lutheran, &c. is 2000. These are exclusive of a very large number who are paying the expenses of

their own education, and who are equally pious and promising.

have no allowance. Every curate must examine, weekly, the children of the school of his parish. A general examination must be held annually, by the deans of the districts, of the schools within their respective precincts; and a report of the condition of the schools, the talents and attention of the schoolmasters, the state of the buildings, and the attendance of the children, made to the office of the vicargeneral, who is bound to transmit all these reports to the royal domain offices, from which orders are issued to supply the deficiencies of the schools, and to correct any abuses that may be found to prevail. If one school suffice for more than one village, neither of them must be more than half a German mile, or two and one-fourth British miles distant from it in the flat country, nor more than half that distance in the mountainous parts.

It is to the numerous establishments of education -the extensive range of instruction they embrace -the opportunities of instruction afforded to the lowest classes of the community-the superior degree of comfort they enjoy-and to the elevation of character promoted by their free institutions, that we are to attribute the non-existence, in most parts of the United States, of what is usually termed a mob or rabble, and that depredations are less frequent, and property more secure, than in other countries. In the Southern States, indeed, the means of education are not so extensive, nor has society advanced to such a state of moral and mental improvement, as in the Northern. The reason is obvious. These States, with a most glaring inconsistency, still continue the abettors of slavery, in its This system had at first many difficulties to strugmost disgusting forms. More than one-half of their gle with, from the indolence of the Catholic clergy, population consists of slaves, who are deemed un-and their consequent aversion to the new and trouworthy of enjoying the blessings even of a common education. A spirit of haughtiness and domination prevails among the influential classes, barbarous amusements among the lower; and Christian morals, the finer feelings of humanity, and intellectual acquisitions, are too frequently disregarded.

zines, which appeared by the day, the week, the month, or the quarter; many of them upon subjects generally useful, and containing valuable information and instruction for the people. At the former period, there were but three booksellers, and all these at Breslaw; but in 1801, there were six in that capital, and seven dispersed in the other cities. The number of printing presses, and of bookbinders, had increased in a similar proportion. Agriculture and manufactures, too, have been vastly improved and extended; so that Silesia is, at this moment, one of the most flourishing districts of the Continent. The habits of the people have been signally improved; and they have become among the most intelligent, orderly, and industrious, in Europe.*

blesome duty imposed upon them. Their zeal was alarmed at the danger arising from this diffusion of light to the stability of their church. They considered the spirit of innovation and the spirit of inquiry as equally their natural enemies; and the system still finds a certain degree of resistance from Silesia. This country, in consequence of the ex- the penurious economy and the stubborn love of ertions of Frederick the Great, is now richly fur- darkness, which still prevail in some parts of this nished with scholastic establishments. Prior to 1765, province. But in so far as it has been acted upon, Silesia, like the rest of Europe, was but wretchedly its operation has proved a blessing to multitudes. provided either with schools or with teachers. In As a proof of its extensive effects, the number of the small towns and villages, the schoolmasters were schools, in 1752, amounted only to 1552; but in 1798, so poorly paid, that they could not subsist without their number was more than 3500; and many other practising some other trade besides their occupation facts, equally clear, attest the progressive increase as instructers; and they usually united the character of knowledge, and a desire for improvement. Beof the village fiddler with that of the village school- fore the seven years' war, there had scarcely ever master. Frederick issued an ordinance, that a school been more than one periodical journal or gazette should be kept in every village, and that a compe- published in Silesia at one time; but in 1801, there tent subsistence should be provided for the school-were no less than seventeen newspapers and magamaster by the joint contribution of the lord of the village and the tenants. Felbiger, an Augustine monk, belonging to a convent at Sagan, travelled to different countries to obtain an acquaintance with the best modes of teaching. After spending some years at Berlin, to obtain a perfect knowledge of the best method of instruction in the schools of that city, he returned to Sagan, and made the convent to which he belonged a seminary for candidates as schoolmasters. Pattern schools were established at Breslaw, Glatz, and other places, on the principles he had adopted, and all candidates for the office of teachers, were obliged to attend these seminaries, and to practise the method in which they were there instructed. The clergy, no less than the teachers, were required to go through this process, because Wirtemberg, Baden, Bavaria, &c.-In Wirtemthe superintendence of the teachers was to be com- berg, during the last thirty years, the system of edumitted to them. After these preparatory matters cation has been very greatly extended and improved. had been carried into effect, an ordinance was pub- A public school is established in every parish, and, in lished in the year 1765, prescribing the mode of some instances, in every hamlet. The master reteaching, and the manner in which the clergy should ceives, as in Scotland, a fixed salary from the parish, superintend the system. The teachers were directed exclusive of a small fee from the pupils, varying ac to give plain instruction, and upon subjects applica- cording to their age and the subjects in which they ble to the ordinary concerns of life; not merely to are instructed. The fees are fixed by government, load the memory of their scholars with words, but to and are every where the same. Exclusive of the make things intelligible to their understanding, to salaries and fees, the masters are furnished with a habituate them to the use of their own reason, by house, a garden, and, in most instances, a few acres explaining every object of their lesson, so that the of ground, corresponding to the glebes of the Scottchildren themselves may be able to explain it, upon ish clergy. The law requires that the children examination. The school tax must be paid by the should be instructed in reading, writing and arithlord and tenants, without distinction of religions.-metic; and it is specially enacted, that they shall be The boys must all be sent to school from their sixth to their thirteenth year, whether the parents are able to pay the school tax or not. For the poor the school money must be raised by collections. Every parent or guardian who neglects to send his child or pupil to school, without sufficient cause, is obliged to pay a double tax, for which the guardians shall

instructed in the principles of German grammar and composition. The books used in the schools of Wirtemberg and Baden, are very superior to those

* See President Adams' Letters on Silesia, Quarterly Journal of Education, and Glasgow Geography, vol. iii.