Popular Education

culties-subjecting his senses, his understanding, and his passions to reason, to c

lls to the ground, has provided for the supply of their wants, and has adapted each to the element in which it moves. To birds he has given a clothing of feathers; and to quadrupeds, of furs, adapted to their latitudes. Where art is requisite in providing food for future want, or in constructing a needful habitation, as in

of the earth, history exhibits the early human inhabitants in states of ignorance and barbarism, not far removed from this lowest possible grade, which civilized men may shudder to contemplate. But these countries, occupied formerly by straggling hordes of miserable savages, who could scarcely defend themselves against the wild beasts that shared the woods with them, and the inclemencies of the weather, and the consequences of

e visible and permanent, and enlarging illimitably the repositories of knowledge. Language thus, at the present moment of the world's existence, may be said to bind the whole human race of uncounted millions into one gigantic rational being, whose memory reaches to the beginnings of written records, and retains imperishably the important events that have occurred; whose judgment, analyzing the treasures of memory, has discovered many of the sublime

" The preceding sketch may remind us of the low condition of man in a state of ignorance and barbarism, and of the high condition to which he may be brought by cultivation. We possess a material and an immaterial part, mutually dep

ory of the human race, the days of his pilgrimage were protracted several hundred years. In process of time, because of the prevalence of sin, a universal deluge swept away the entire family of man, save one-a preacher of righteousness-and those of his household. Subsequently his days were shortened to three score years

ircumstances, it becomes the duty of the Educator to unfold the opening energies of his youthful charge; to mold their plastic cha

on the expediency and means of elevating the profession of the educator in society, published in London, under the direction of the central society of education, one of the writers, introducing a quotation from an American author, s

influences and disciplines, and thus molds it at last into the image of a perfect man; armed at all points to use the body, nature, and life for its growth and renewal, and to hold dominion over the fluctuating things of the outward. It seeks to realize in the soul the image of the Creator. Its end is a perfect ma

y beau ideal of human nature would be a being whose intellectual faculties were active and enlightened; whose moral sentiments were dignified and firm; whose physical formation was healthy and beautiful: whoever falls short of this,

is requisite to the cultivation and improvement of the faculties bestowed upon them by the Creator. It ought to embrace every thing that has a tendency to strengthen and invigorate the animal system; to enlighten and expand the understanding; to regulate the feelings and disposit

n this subject in one of our encyclopedias, education is defined to be "that series of means by which the human understanding is gradually enlightened, between infancy and the period when we consider ourselves

t into the hands of the young; but they have never been taught to unlock the gates to the temple of science, to enter within its portals, to contemplate its treasures, and to feast their minds on the entertainments there provided. Several moral maxims have been impressed on their memories; but they have seldom been taught to

oral excellence. His tuition, therefore, can not be supposed to terminate at any period of his terrestrial existence; and the course of his life ought to be considered as nothing more than the course of his education. When he closes his eyes in death, and bids a last adieu to every thing here below, he passes into a more permanent and expansive s

overlooked. Volumes have been written on the best modes of training men for the profession of a soldier, of a naval officer, of a merchant, of a physician, of a lawyer, of a clergyman, and of a statesman; but I know of no treatise on this subject which, in connection with other subordinate aims, has for its grand object to develop that train of instruction which is most appropriate for man considered as a candidate for immortality. This is the more unaccountable, since, in the works alluded to, the eternal destiny of human beings is not called in question, and is sometimes referred to as a general position which can not be denied; yet the means of instruction requisite to guide them in safety to their final destination, and to prepare them for the employments of their everlasting abode, are either overlooked, or referred to in general terms, as if they were unworthy of particular

s, and the establishing of those institutions, which are calculated to train the minds of all to knowledge and moral rectitude, and to guide their steps in the path which leads to a blessed immortality. In this process there is no period in human life t

l relation to each other, that each is best secured by that system of training and in the use of those appliances by which the other is most successfully promoted. In training the rising generation for the proper discharge of their duty to themselves and to one another-as children, and subsequently as parents; as members of society and citizens

that unite him with friends, with kindred, and with the great family of mankind, and makes his bosom glow with social tenderness; it confirms the emotions of sympathy into habitual benevolence, imparts to him the elating delight of rejoicing with those who rejoice, and, if his means are not always adequate to the suggestions of his charity, soothes him at last with the melancholy pleasure of weeping with those who weep." To age, it gives consolation, by remembrance of the past, and anticipation of the future. Wisdom is drawn from experience, to give constancy to virtue; and amid all the vicissitudes of life, it enables him to repo

be accomplished, and consequently laid by, to be used as interest may suggest or convenience demand? Education comprehends all the improvements of the mind from the cradle to the grave. Every man is what education has made him, whether he has drunk deep at the Pierian spring, or sipped at the humblest fountain. The philosopher, whose comprehensive mind can scan the universe, and

e body continually modifies the state of the mind, and the mind ever varies the condition of the body. Mental and physical training should, then, go together. That system of instruction which relates exclusively to either, is a partial system, and its fate

nferior animals. They labor hard, and boast of their strength; gratify their passions, and glory in their shame; eat and drink, sleep and wake, supposing to-morrow will be like the present. They are scarcely aware of their rational, intellectual powers, much less of their ever-expanding and never-dying spirits; consequently they feel but imperfectly their responsibility, and are governed principally by the fear of human authority. They have been taught to fear or rev

hose kinder feelings and sympathetic emotions which alone result from the cultivation of the moral susceptibilities, and become insensible to the more delicate affections of the soul, and elevating hopes of the truly virtuous. They have nothing on which to rest for enjoyment but intellectual attainments. And even these are small compared with what they might have been under a different course of education. Yet with what delight are the first developments of intellect discovered by the natural guardian of the infant mind! and with what anxious solicitude are they watched through advancing youth and manhood by those e

ying them ever satisfied. They become fanatics-religious enthusiasts. They have zeal without knowledge, and seem resolved on bringing all to their standard. They enlist in the work all the sympathies of the soul-its tenderest sensibilities and most compassionate feelings. Without intellect to guide, and physical strength to sustain them, they sink under moral excitement, and become deranged: a result that might be anticipated from such an education; and one that is often developed, in some of its milder f

ther being. In their natures, original susceptibilities, and ultimate destinies, they are alike. They are material, intellectual, and spiritual; animal, rational, and immortal. On these uniform traits of character edu

phical and dangerous theory has seldom been embraced, as the melancholy results abundantly testify. We shall therefore devote a chapter to physical education, which seems to lie at the foundation of the great work of hum