minational school; whether a new school could be successfully sustained, &c. Such questions must have careful consideration. Each Church must judge for itself, whether it is desirable to establish a school for the better religious education of its children.

2. In the second place, the establishment of a school by a Church, does not imply hostility to the public schools, as having a great mission of their own. The public system may be on the whole a great advantage to the country, and, although not fulfilling all the objects of education, may be entitled to support on general considerations of the public good. Some of the most devoted advocates of State schools are the firmest friends of Church schools, and vice versa.

Our Church is bent upon no measure of fanaticism. Her plan of operations is religious in spirit, conciliatory in its tone, and co-operative in its measures. Whilst it aims at supplying a want which the public system cannot meet, it adheres to the latter as an important instrumentality of the State, whose usefulness may be still more enlarged by improvements and modifications.

In our Church schools, religion should occupy its true place, as an element of all sound culture. The religious part of the instruction is promoted in three ways, by acts of worship, formal religious instruction, and Christian government. First, by acts of worship. Children should be taught to recognize God. If we are required to do all for His glory, whether we eat, or drink, or whatever we do, it is surely right to introduce divine worship into the school-room, and to invoke God's blessing upon teacher and pupil. Prayer harmonizes in a peculiar manner with all the objects and the responsibilities of education. The teacher is engaged in the training of immortal minds, and possesses facilities for giving favourable impressions of religion. With the blessing of God upon his labours, great results may be accomplished. It is no small advantage to children to be educated with habits of divine worship, daily inwrought into the thoughts of their hearts and the ways of their lives. Daily prayers at school, uttered in simple, unaffected, genial language, and with due solemnity, may become important aids in establishing habits of reverence for religion, and cherishing sentiments of its transcendent worth. The reading of the Bible accompanies prayer, as an act of worship. The word of God leads the thoughts to right views and meditations, and is an interesting part of all exercises that render homage to the Supreme Being. Singing is wisely and properly introduced into our Church schools. No service is more winning in its religious tendency, or attended with happier effects on the mind and heart. It is as useful in giving variety to the exercises of a school, as it is attractive as a religious act. The too general neglect of singing in many of our congregations, is a strong plea for more attention to music in our schools and higher institutions. If singing be kept out of the family and out of the school, it can hardly be brought into the Church. One of the

reasons, and probably the chief one, for the prevalent inattention to singing the praises of God in our congregations, is its neglect in the family circle; and one of the best means of reviving its use and of promoting its better cultivation, is to make it one of the regular branches of the educational course.

Next to acts of worship, in giving a religious character to schools, is the direct inculcation of religious truth. The Bible must not only be read publicly in worship, but it must be used as a textbook of formal instruction. Its true place is not as a reading book from which to learn a mere art, but as a text-book from which to acquire divine knowledge and wisdom. Sacred books should have sacred associations; and the Bible ought not to be turned into a Primer, and thus lowered to a mere secular study. No school can be of the right character, where the religious training, commenced in the family, cannot be carried on. It is not enough merely to read a few verses in the Bible at the opening of a school. Such a compromise would fail to secure the great objects of religious instruction. Divine truth has claims of the same kind as the branches of secular knowledge. It must be taught; it must be lodged in the mind by study, by recitation, by repetition. "Line upon line, precept upon precept." At least one daily recitation should be strenuously insisted on, as the lowest demand of Christian duty. In addition to the Bible, the Catechism forms a part of our school instruction; the Catechism, not as an armory of sectarian strife, but as a Compend of biblical truth adapted to secure an intelligent knowledge of the plan of salvation. The Shorter Catechism contains no ecclesiastical peculiarities of Presbyterianism. Its contents are doctrinal and practical. Although beyond the range of the intellect of children in various parts, still, like the rules of grammar and arithmetic, which are equally incomprehensible, if not more so, these doctrines must be mastered for future use. It is a good principle to teach children things in a way that they are not required to unlearn them, when they grow older. The answers of the Westminster Catechism present Christian doctrine with a precision that unfolds its meaning with the growth of the understanding. The germ which, in the spring of life, appeared useless and even insignificant, becomes in maturer years, like the cedar of Lebanon, stately and strong, and fit for use in building the temple of God. The Bible and the Catechism are books which have trained up many souls in heavenly wisdom, and which have made Presbyterians intelligent to know, energetic to do, and patient to suffer, in the things pertaining to Christ and His kingdom. These books are not merely family books, and Church books, they are educational books, to accompany our youth through all the stages of public instruction from the primary school up through the Academy and College into the Theological Seminary.

The third mode of securing religious ends in schools is by a religious administration. The government and discipline of a school,

as well as its general management, should be based on Christian principles. God has ordained that the vital power of personal religion should have an intimate connection with its propagation. The teacher himself must be religious in order to impart religious instruction in a hopeful manner. The atmosphere of Christian life should pervade the places of education. The highest style of teacher is one, clothed upon with the righteousness of Christ. The outward administration must conform to the great design of human training. Government and discipline must illustrate doctrine and duty; and personal example be not only winning in its spirit, but sacred in its authority.

These are the views and principles, which our parochial schools are endeavouring to carry into practice. And it is confidently believed that the blessing of God will go with His people in all earnest and wise efforts to bring up their children in His nurture and admonition.

The Church has the deepest interest in the primary training of her children. The idea that her sons and daughters may be securely left to any sort of public education in its early stages, but that when they enter academies and colleges, they must then be placed under religious influences, has no warrant in reason, scripture, or Providence. The foundations of character are laid very early in life. If it is important to have religious colleges, is it safe to be without religious schools? So it may seem to the wisdom of men; but the promise of God is to the training of the child. The law of early process being established in truth and piety, the future becomes by divine grace subject to its power; and the whole educational course, thus imbued with the religious spirit, has hope of the blessing of God and of the commendation of Christian men.

The Board report the establishment of a number of new schools since the beginning of the year 1853. These all date their origin to the munificent offer of Five Thousand Dollars, from one of the ruling elders of the Church, to be spent in sustaining parochial schools. God raises up friends in times of emergency. The Board regret that they have not been able to avail themselves of the donation to its full extent, inasmuch as the calls for aid did not, according to the adopted scale of distribution, exhaust the amount offered. The donation has been renewed for another year, with the hope of the donor that the whole sum may be wisely spent in promoting the cause. The amount of aid, usually given by the Board to any one school is one hundred dollars. The fact that we have in our Church individual members, who are disposed to devote so large a sum to Christian education under ecclesiastical supervision, shows that the subject is regarded with deep interest, and that funds in abundance will be supplied. Some of the schools are remarkably prosperous; and report hopeful conversions among the older scholars.

PRESBYTERIAL ACADEMIES.

There are forty-seven Presbyterial Academies in operation. These institutions are scattered about in all parts of the country, and are doing a work of vital importance to the Church.

The two points which require the constant care of the Presbyteries are first, to give to religion its due prominence in the course of instruction; and secondly, to make the Academies first-class institutions in all the departments of secular study.

The main object in establishing these institutions is to secure thorough religious instruction to the youth of the Church, according to the Presbyterian standards. Our Church has never undertaken to erect a platform on which errorists may occupy an unrebuked position; nor has she ever aimed in her official capacity to get up a comprehension or compromise scheme, to include all evangelical denominations. Our maintenance of the truth professes to be founded upon the love of it, and to be firm and conciliatory. There is as little sectarianism in our standards as can be found in those of any denomination. But what our Church believes to be true, she does not hesitate to teach to be true. The Bible being the great text-book of faith and practice, is the basis of all religious instruction, at home, in the school, and in the Church. Our Presbyterial Academies should make much of the Bible and of the studies which naturally centre around it. A regular course of Biblical instruction is of the highest importance in forming right Christian character, and in anticipating the suggestions of error, so common to the natural heart in all periods of life. No student ought to pass through a regular Academical training without obtaining a good knowledge of Biblical history and doctrine. Nor can this knowledge be obtained without systematic study. The religious part of a liberal course of education has claims to a place in the regular course of Academical studies. One recitation daily is demanded by the importance of this branch of human knowledge.

The Board venture to suggest the importance of paying more attention to studies in the Old Testament, a portion of the divine word too apt to be depreciated, and yet one eminently suited to the moral and religious instruction of the young. If God, in his all-wise providence, adopted the plan of gradually unfolding his purposes of mercy, and took 4000 years to train the world into the expectation of the Messiah, the study of this plan, as developed in the history and in the moral and ceremonial observances of the Old Testament, must necessarily possess an important influence in enlightening and impressing the human mind, in every age on the subject of Redemption. As a portion of the inspired record, the Old Testament cannot be neglected with impunity. But its special adaptation to the young consists in its elementary character, as related to the succeeding portions of revelation. The celebrated DR. GORDON of Edin

burgh, gives the following testimony to the use of Old Testament studies in the religious training of the young:

"I think the simple and elementary truths of Christianity are to be best learned from the Old Testament. And I cannot help taking this opportunity of drawing attention to the great use which may be made of that book in the instruction of the young. None who have been seriously engaged in the religious tuition of children, and have really been anxious to convey clear and distinct ideas on the subject of their teaching, can have failed to experience the difficulty of making themselves understood, while stating and endeavouring to explain even the simplest truths, when presented in an abstract form-I mean, as they are put down even in that unrivalled of human works, our Shorter Catechism. At least such is my own experience. But I can also state, as a matter of experience too, that as often as in such cases I betook myself to the Old Testament for help, it never failed me. It furnished illustrations so simple and so abundant, that there was no longer any difficulty in speaking intelligibly, and seldom an instance in which these illustrations failed to arrest attention and to awaken interest. Those who are conversant with the New Testament will find the gospel everywhere in the Old, and that, in connection with such narratives, such incidents, such manifestations of character, as have a peculiar charm for the youthful mind, and a peculiar power for laying hold of the youthful memory.

These views deserve the attentive consideration of all Christian educationists. In our Academies, the youth are expected to be sufficiently advanced in their studies to enter with profit upon a regular and full course of Biblical instruction. The Catechism will also occupy its due share of attention, and other parts of our doctrinal standards, be introduced according to the age and capacity of the pupil. Singing should also be regularly taught in all our Academies.

The Board believe that the success of our educational movement greatly depends upon keeping steadily in view the great object which led to its adoption, viz., the systematic inculcation of religion upon the minds, and hearts, and consciences of the young.

2. Our Presbyterial Academies must also aim at adopting and maintaining a high standard of education in all the secular branches of study. Religion demands the homage of the most thorough intellectual development; and the true companionship of Biblical instruction is general scholarship of the highest attainable order. It is commonly admitted that the educational tendency in our country is rather towards the superficial than the substantial and solid. This tendency the Church should endeavour to resist and correct. Our Presbyterial institutions will fail in their true purpose if they do not establish themselves upon the old foundations of thorough instruction and discipline. Parade and show do not belong, of right, to Presbyterianism. Our institutions should aim at having the best teachers, the most substantial course of studies, and the most excellent system of government. The character of our Church is concerned in elevating the literary rank of the academies of the country. There is in general much confidence throughout the community in Presbyterians as educators; and it is all important for us to maintain this reputation at the present day.