ing marks the whole structure of American society more than the perfect supremacy of the principle of adaptation which is made the test of every thing which claims to be useful. Let this test be applied to every proposed modification of the American system of education coming from a foreign land.

Nor will this censorship, be it ever so rigidly applied, delay the progress of real improvement. It will not tend to lower at all the standard of attainments, or diminish the industrial activity of the pupils, in any of our literary institutions. In these respects our predecessors have never laid any claim to perfection and there is yet to be reached a limit not discerned by our eyes in the progress of improvement. This fact, however, does not render it the less necessary to refer to the plans and search for the true aims of those who have gone before us. They have done that which entitles them to the gratitude of all their descendants. They have committed to us the completion of a work not yet accomplished though perfect in its design, like the building of the ancient cathedrals, needing generations and centuries even, yet perhaps, to complete the original plan.

But do we not claim more for our predecessors than is actually their due? How can we presume to speak with respect of the schools and modes of instruction belonging even to recent periods in our history? It is thought proper to extol the virtues and wisdom of our fathers for what they did in the cause of civil liberty and religious freedom, but in all that pertains to the managements of schools and methods of teaching, the present age is so much in advance of former times that we may say

"Let the dead past bury its dead." We recur not to the past because we think the former days were bet

ter or equal to these in respect to the facilities or means of instruction. Every grade of schools in this country has exhibited most surprising marks of progress in all that pertains to the machinery of educa tion. "It is wonderful," said Pres ident Woolsey in his inaugural address, "what improvements have been made in collegiate instruction during the last twenty-nine years,” the period of his predecessor's administration. The standard of attainments in the preparatory schools has advanced in proportion, so that the amount of classical learning now acquired at Andover and Exe ter by candidates for the freshmen classes of Harvard and Yale, is greater than at the time of gradua. tion at those colleges half a century since. And common schools in the days of the Revolution, in respect to external appearances, would compare with the same grade of schools in our times, much in the same way that the plain sideboard of General Washington compares with the princely furniture, which surrounds it in the East room of the President's palace.

If all the essential forms and institutions of society in the first days of the republic were simple and unobtrusive, and there was little to attract the attention of those accustomed to the conveniences and refinements of modern modes of life, still those times were adorned by the presence of shining virtues and noble men. The same facilities for instruction were not enjoyed, but the great end and aim of all learning was well understood by those who had the management of affairs in church and state.

Whenever questions of political philosophy or theories of civil gov ernment or church polity are discussed, nothing is more common than to refer to ancient usages and constitutions, not indeed for the purpose of imitating the external forms, now grown obsolete, but to search

for the elemental principles of truth which gave vitality to those forms, and still live in those that have superseded them.

Can nothing be learned in the philosophy of popular education, its proper uses and ends in such a country as this, from the study of a system as ancient as the settlement of the country? Can not some thing be learned of the mutual relations of each grade of our schools to each other, and how they stand connected with the welfare and glory of the commonwealth, by the study of a system which dates back to Plymouth Rock for its origin, and which has been sustained ever since with unwavering constancy, with an ever growing interest?

It is very true that literary institutions of every grade in this country differ very much from the schools of Europe, even from those bearing the same name. It is doubtful whether an institution, modeled after the English or German universities, will be established in this country, although there can be no doubt but that, in the mature ages of American civilization, there will be found on this soil, institutions of learning equal in respectability to those of the old world.

The same will hold true of schools of lower grades. The conditions and circumstances of the pupils in different countries, will render necessary, different standards of attainment, and call for various modes of teaching, and different modes of discipline. If this rule, were observed when comparisons are instituted between the literary institutions of the old world and the new, there would be less of that wholesale disparagement of our higher schools we sometimes hear, because we have not as yet in this country a grade of institutions similar to the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge, and on the other hand, there would be less tendency to discard institutions properly and naturally Ameri

can. Let Paris rule, as hitherto, the fashions of the civilized world, if she must. Let her pride herself in the exercise of a power whose monthly mandates all our republican tailors and mantua-makers tremble to disobey, but why must we follow the speculations of French republicans and socialists as genuine philosophy? Why bow with so much reverence to theories of social and political life, whose "local habitation" is in the Cloud Land of German transcendentism? The ready credence given to many foreign theories of education, and the earnest effort to realize them by introducing them into our institutions, at the same time discarding what is properly the growth of our own soil, proves any thing, but a free and independent spirit. The position we occupy, the destiny we are to accomplish, one would think, might teach us what a truly noble and proud people would not be slow to learn. While it is most evident that the facilities for gaining knowledge have greatly increased and important improvements have been made in the modes of imparting instruction, in all our schools of every grade, are we quite sure that an apprehension, clear and definite in proportion to these facilities and improvements, prevails as to the proper uses of learning and its relations to the public welfare? It is no disparagement to modern improvements, to say that if our predecessors did not enjoy our advantages for acquiring learning, they did very clearly appreciate its proper and highest ends, and because their means were limited and the processes of acquisition more expensive and laborious, they might perhaps, for these reasons, be less liable to mistake the means for the ends of learning, and be less likely to suffer the show of mere knowledge to take the place of true intellectual culture. And, most certainly, it was because the relations of

learning to the wants of society in New England, were clearly seen, that even the scanty means of our fathers were so productive of useful results, and the schools which now might be called comparatively poor, were, to former generations, a priceless blessing.

It is now often a theme for pleas antry, to hold up, for the amusement of the young, the rude, rough apparatus of education, such as used to be employed no longer ago than the recollection of the "oldest inhabitants," and was entirely satisfactory to the scholars of those days because nothing better could be had. We meet these contrasts, not only in the lectures of common school agents, on the best methods of constructing school-houses and ventilating school-rooms. The shades of President Stiles and the Dominie Sampsons of "sixty years since," are not allowed to repose quietly on commencement festivals and College Alumni meetings.

And if half a century has wrought such changes, what shall be thought of the schools and teachers of still more primitive times? History is not wholly silent respecting the schools and colleges of the first ages of New England. We have heard of Master Ezekiel Cheever, the "father of Connecticut schoolmasters," who early settled in New Haven colony and died at the age of ninety-four, having been a "skillful, painful, and faithful schoolmaster for seventy years." It seems that teaching was a regular profession in those days. Cheever was the author of an Accidence, a famous school-book in its day, he being the first, so far as we know, among the New England school. masters, to write his own text-book of instruction; thus early setting an example which many of the best teachers of our times seem ambi

tious to imitate.

Cotton Mather has mentioned in his Magnalia, one Nathaniel Eaton,

the teacher of the first grammar school in Cambridge, which, under his successor, President Dunster, was honored with the name of a college. Being somewhat avari cious and excessively severe school discipline, and finally having apostatized from the Puritans and become an Episcopalian, Mather says, that "he was a blade who marvelously deceived the expectations of good men concerning him, and yet he was a rare scholar and made many more such, though they were taught in the school of Tyrannus."

It may perhaps be soberly thought by some that the schools and teachers of the first generations were of no real service. Placed by the side of the schools of this wonderful era, it may be asked, could such meager foundations, such rude ap paratus, such wretched text-books have served any valuable ends? Surely our " patent modes of teach ing," our beautiful apparatus and spacious school edifices, our textbooks of such rare excellence and in such numbers too, that a new work in every science is published once a quarter, must have all sprung at once from a perfect chaos of ignorance, and it can not be possible that this glorious era of light and know!. edge which we witness, is in any way related to those barbarous ages. So far as regards the present con dition or future glory of the American people, would it not have been about as well if Harvard and Yale had each been founded at least a century later in their respective commonwealths?

It does however appear to be a fact attested by veritable history, that New England, at least prior to the Revolution, was a land famous for its free schools, that at that time, the foundations of a great nation were laid by a people unsurpassed in the world for their general intelligence, and that even then the system of education which now is our

boast, had existed for generations, and had been sustained without the aid of boards of education or other useful agencies on which we depend for the advancement of learning. The Puritans did really more than devise an excellent theory of popular education. They transmitted to after ages more than the record of a well meant endeavor, although the fact, that they originated the conception and designated the method by which all the youth of the commonwealth might obtain the rudiments of an education, has gained for them the admiration of mankind. But they reduced their immortal conception to a historic reality. Not in some fancy model of a republic, but in their earliest constitutions we find this recognized as an elemental principle, that every person is born with the right of instruction, that if parents or guardidians fail to fulfill their own natural obligations in this matter, their children must be educated by the state. Nor did they stop here in their great endeavor to form a free and enlightened commonwealth. The common school with them was neither the beginning nor the end of measures deemed by them essential. The entire system of education in New England was popular in all its parts. That system embraced the university and the college no less than the primary and grammar schools. This was the ancient theory. It ought to be the modern theory. A system with all its parts so vitally interwoven, should never be separated so as to leave the interests of the higher or lower grade of schools to the care and sympathies of different classes of the community. The higher can not dispense with the lower. The lower can never be so much improved as that the higher may be dispensed with. The college, therefore, must never forget or fail to fulfill its popular functions, nor should any theory of common school education be for a

moment sanctioned, which excludes the principle of an intimate and vital relation of dependence upon the higher seminaries. We sometimes hear it said with apparent seriousness, that the common school is the "people's college," as though there was any thing but rhetoric in the phrase, or any thing but an abuse of language and the grossest error as to the true idea of a college. Still more frequently is the idea thrown out by Jacobinical editors and flippant demagogues, that colleges and higher seminaries exist for the benefit of a favored class, and are therefore aristocratic rather than popular in their uses and tendences. Incalculable mischief is the result of these most dangerous errors, for on the one hand, they tend to diminish the proper influence of the higher seminaries, to weaken the sympathy of the public mind in their prosperity, and create a prejudice against those who enjoy their advantages. On the other hand, they introduce the most extravagant notions and systems of popular education. Opinions are maintained by the professed advocates of universal education, utterly subversive of all the great ends for which our ancestors established their system of free schools.

Until a recent period the true relation of dependence of the lower institutions upon the higher seminaries, was every where admitted, even in the popular mind. The fathers cherished the college with their warmest sympathies, and, in proportion to their means, with liberal contributions. On the other hand, there went forth from the universities and higher seminaries, the strongest impulses and influences in favor of popular education. If the mutual relations of the higher and lower seminaries be looked at historically, it will be found that progressive movements have begun in the higher and not in the lower seminaries. The elevation of the

standard of admission to the colleges has been followed by a correspond ing advancement in the course of instruction in academies and high schools. Better furnished candidates being thus prepared for the learned professions and the business of teaching, a quickened activity is thus imparted to all the lower grades of schools in succession, and the sensibility of the popular mind is increased in favor of improvement and progress in every department of the general system, so that no more safe or certain plan of elevating the condition of the primary schools could be devised, than to enlist a deep interest among the people in the prosperity of our colleges and higher seminaries.

Such has been the practical working of the system which has hitherto prevailed. But unless we mistake, signs of a new order of things are manifest. It is becoming fashionable of late, to entrust some of the most important interests of the body politic, to the oversight of particular associations and agents. The idea seems to have been borrowed from the mode of conducting many of the moral and religious enterprises of the day. However efficient such an arrangement may be in enterprises where the business is chiefly executive and financial, we doubt the expediency of introducing the "division of labor" principle to advance the cause of education, by providing for one particular class of schools so exclusively, as to create a strong public impression which shall also be exclusive, and thus become prejudicial to another great in

terest.

The members of the Boards of Education established in New England, are men high in the respect and confidence of the respective states to which they belong. They have devoted themselves to their patriotic work with great zeal and success. But their duty is limited to the oversight of the primary schools. In the voluminous reports

presented to the legislatures of their respective commonwealths, no information is given respecting the condition of academies or colleges. The state of New York furnishes an exception, the Regents of the University having under their supervision all the public literary institu tions, which have received the patronage of the state.

We think the tendency of the ar rangement generally in use, is to lead the people to think that common schools alone can properly claim the sympathy and support of the commonwealth, and that the higher institutions must be sustained by individual munificence, though they confer on the whole population incalculable benefits. We believe our colleges will be sustained, and continue to pour forth blessings, though left to the support of the friends of liberal education. Still it is very obvious, that a large part of our population are indifferent to their prosperity, while by not a few they are regarded with jealousy and open hostility. The existence of these adverse popular prejudices, tends greatly to circumscribe the in fluence of those who receive the advantages of a liberal education, and who in general fully appreciate the great work they aim to do, and are doing. Most of the commonwealths of New England have long since withdrawn all patronage from colleges and academies. And where it is not altogether withheld, it is given as it were grudgingly, with extreme hesitancy, more from mo tives of partisan policy, than from any real interest felt in behalf of those institutions, in the legislatures of the people. That state who rejoices in the appellation of "Mother of States," makes her boast of her School Fund, which is indeed managed by a most prudent and discreet financier, and thus affords ample means to produce most meager results; while Yale College, her richest, proudest ornament, has long