SECT. III.-PARALLEL OF THE SYSTEM UNFOLDED IN THIS WORK AND THE ORDINARY METHODS.

Every object proposed from the study of a foreign language is, in our system, presented to the attention of learners in the order and in the manner prescribed by nature; the several exercises indispensable for gaining complete knowledge of it come in succession, so that an accumulation of difficulties is avoided. This division of labour has enabled us to do away with the heterogeneous medley of lessons, which, under the long established system of schools, obstructs the path of study, confuses and disheartens learners.

Two volumes are, at any period of the learner's progress, sufficient for all the requirements of a language,— -one containing the verbs and the words of the Second Class; the other being a reading-book with literal interpretation attached to the foreign text; as he advances, the first is exchanged for a grammar, and the second for works in which the text is gradually divested of explanation until none is required. These works are not only instrumental in imparting the power of understanding the language written and spoken; but they also offer model phrases and model subjects for practice in speaking, and afford means of attaining, through double translation, the art of writing both the native and the foreign language.

The usual practice of burdening children with a diversity of lessons, probably takes its rise in the unreasonable demand of parents for ostensible learning. They wish to get value for their money, and, as they cannot always judge of mental development, the master is obliged, in his own defence, to cram exhibitable knowledge into his pupils. Nothing hinders improvement more than this multiplicity of lessons. When attention is directed to different objects at the same time, the faculties of reflection and abstraction remain inactive. The greater number of children, not feeling interested in their lessons put off learning them to the last moment; and soon forget what is thus hastily committed to memory. In class, pupils cannot avoid being inattentive and listless during the performance of mnemonic exercises in which neither they nor their instructors can take any interest. The most diligent scholars feel no inducement to listen when others are repeating what they already know; idlers are probably, during that time, engaged in preparing some

excuse, or some contrivance to impose on the master, or to escape the rod. At best, each member of a class, while waiting for his turn to be examined, loses all the time occupied by the others in going through their lessons. But, worse than all, this lazy hearing of lessons being usually practised to ascertain veracity rather than give assistance, debases moral character by constant suspicion.

Our censure of mnemonic lessons applies exclusively to those branches of instruction which should be more properly addressed to the judgment; it does not bear on the study of words as elements of phrase-making, nor on learning select pieces in prose and verse for the practice of elocutional recitations. These two exercises are not so objectionable in class as repetition of the lessons above alluded to; for they do not consist in merely parroting what has been committed to memory, nor, on the teacher simply ascertaining the diligence or veracity of his pupils. Their application to a useful purpose not only justifies their adoption, but renders them both interesting and instructive to all the members of the class.

The few lessons learned are not recited in class; but the pupils are taught by the instructor how to apply them. Self-instruction in his absence prepares them to profit by his presence. In the unnatural methods most generally pursued, the professor has little to do except to correct grammatical exercises and listen to his pupils reading aloud, translating, parsing, and reciting; in ours, he conforms to the imitative and analogical process of nature by making them practise at once what is ultimately required,—hearing and speaking the foreign language: he imparts to them information which they cannot obtain from books; he teaches them what they cannot learn by themselves, and thus promotes their improvement, even though they have not prepared any thing for him. The practice of doing little more than hearing lessons has contributed much to render the teacher's assistance unprofitable, and bring his office into disrepute. He who makes his chief occupation consist in hearing his pupils repeat what they have learned in the intervals of his lessons, does not render them much more valuable services than a nursery-maid would be capable of affording. The business of the instructor ought to begin where the purport of the book ends.

By the present method learners can easily understand the reason of what they do, because the means are always consistent with the end: all their exercises are the very objects aimed at in

the study of a language. Seeing their instructor perform his part, they cannot but be anxious to act their own, particularly as they find that every unnecessary obstacle is removed, and that the tasks imposed on them are few, agreeable, and indispensable. They may then be trusted for the fulfilment of their duty. The confidence placed in them cultivates moral feeling; it would almost suffice to make them honourable even were they otherwise inclined. Although, in this system, memory is not engaged in learning vocabularies, dialogues, extracts, and rules of grammar, it must not be inferred that it is not brought into action. The considerable number of words and idioms which, in the course of reading and hearing, come within the observation and practice of learners in connection with valuable information, give to the retentive faculty sufficient scope for exercise, while practice in phrase-making, narration and conversation, calls into full play recollection and judgment. Again, the model expressions offered for imitation in the analogical speaking exercise, and the second version of the double translation, which aims at reproducing the original text, cultivate intellectual memory: in all these instances it is engaged on ideas as well as on words.

The proposed method does not allow any faculty to remain inactive: it is both intuitive and intellectual, All the powers of a child, physical and mental, which can be made to bear on language, harmoniously concur in the study. The eye and the ear are as busily engaged in receiving impressions as are attention and memory in observing and retaining them; the voice and the hand are as diligently employed in giving out expressions, as imagination and judgment in preparing and combining them.

The formation of habits, which is so little considered in the generality of methods, has been insisted upon, as being the only means of retaining the practical knowledge of a language in its four departments. As the mind acts simultaneously with the physical organs in this four-fold acquisition, it has been made to contract habits corresponding to those of the eye in reading the language, to those of the ear in hearing, to those of the tongue in speaking, and to those of the hand in writing.

Finally, every part of the system leads a learner, by a progressive series of exercises, to the power of thinking in the foreign language, that is, of conceiving the ideas of others and expressing his own without the intervening medium of the native tongue. This great desideratum, by which knowledge of a foreign idiom is assimilated to that of the vernacular, although indis

pensable to render its possession useful under all circumstances, is never contemplated in the routine of scholastic acquirements: learners translate, but read not the classics; their acquaintance with them is through a distorted medium which keeps from view all that is beautiful in them. Thus is one of the great aims of classical studies defeated.

In the ordinary methods, students frequently lose sight of the end in pursuing the means: they are given to understand that their labour is over when they begin to read aloud, translate or parse the foreign language with fluency, when they have conjugated all the verbs and repeated a volume of dialogues, when they have learned all the rules and written all the exercises of their grammar; and yet all these are only preliminary acquisitions, unavailable in the business of life.

This dreary circle of unprofitable tasks, without the cheering prospect of future advantage, has been, until now, the gloomy lot of young people. The present work has been undertaken to assist in delivering the rising generation from the wretchedness endured by their fathers: we have endeavoured to secure to learners, as they advance, the reward of their industry,-to make them conscious of improvement by increased facility in understanding the written and spoken language, in combining words and in narrations, in recollecting the foreign text of the double translation, and in original compositions,-true measures of progress in really useful acquirements. Thus every new step is an encouragement to press on farther, and they proceed with increasing delight and ardour as they feel conscious that they approach the goal.

We have, throughout, adduced reasons for our recommendation of particular exercises, and shown the benefits which they confer. These reasons, or others which the professor may have in support of any particular plan which he adopts, he should communicate to his pupils, when they are of an age to understand and appreciate them. Being thus rendered conscious of the usefulness of their various exercises, they will perform them with more pleasure and apply to study with more diligence and alacrity. Many of the principles unfolded in this work have, at different times, been brought into practice, but, in an isolated and incomplete manner, which has lessened the advantages to be expected from them. The mutual assistance of which they are capable, and on which their efficiency principally depends, has been generally overlooked, owing sometimes to the exaggerated importance

attributed to some exclusively, at other times to neglect of the exercises which could fully elicit them, and, not unfrequently, to the immature age at which they are imposed on learners.

The interlineal translations of the so-called "Hamiltonian method," great as is the aid they afford in acquiring the art of reading, for which alone that method was recommended by Locke, Dumarsais, and Condillac, cannot, when unconnected with other exercises, enable learners to converse or compose in a foreign language. These writers, in their strictures on this subject, proposing exclusively to improve classical studies, naturally confined their suggestions to the means of facilitating the first steps in Latin reading: they never pretended that the interlineal method had power beyond this.

Study of a model work, as recommended by Jacotot, is undoubtedly useful; but it is a perversion of principles to confine learners to one work and impose it on them as a task of memory, especially before they know anything of the foreign pronunciation. This practice, however, is not more preposterous than his recommendation of various other exercises on the language, to be performed under the direction of an instructor ignorant of that language,

Dufief and Ollendorff are as opposed to each other in the mode of learning a language as they are to Locke, Dumarsais, Condillac, and Jacotot, yet each proclaims himself the faithful interpreter of nature, because he gives precedence to the facts of language over the rules of grammar. But this is not sufficient to justify the assumption; and, as was shown in the foregoing pages, neither the practice of learning ready-made phrases, nor that of writing exercises, in which their respective methods chiefly consist, could completely secure the power of expression-the only acquirement at which they apparently aim: much less could they forward students in reading standard authors, understanding foreigners, or pronouncing their language. The very title of Ollendorff's work* shows that he did not even suspect that hearing was one of the departments of a language to be acquired. Captain Basil Hall, who, in learning French and German, had used the antagonist methods of Dufief and Ollendorff, praised them both equally; but on what ground we cannot discover. However, it is most probable that the progress he made in those languages was due less to the plans pursued than to his own industry and great mental powers.

* A New Method of Learning to Read, Write, and Speak a Language in Six Months.