uses of the higher branches of science and of the languages. Hence many refuse to send their children to the high school or the college, as a waste of time and money. In the physical system they see the need of general growth and strength. They desire to see their children attain full size and mature health and power of body, and no skill of the hand in any mere useful art would compensate, in their esteem, the dwarfing of the physical system to pigmy size. Why not give to the mind that higher education by which alone it can attain full grown stature and strength. In no point is the popular opinion more at fault than in its estimate of the relative values of the different branches of knowledge. It apparently counts mathematics of more worth than natural sciences, and these of more worth than languages. Hence ten pupils study algebra where one studies chemistry or natural history, and ten study natural science where one studies language. The almost unanimous voice of the greatest and wisest educators would directly reverse this order, and give to language the first and foremost place in the culture of mind and the preparation for life. Want of space forbids any attempt to state the argument in full; but whoever will reflect that study of the forms of language necessitates the study of the natural relations of ideas which those forms express; that a knowledge of the structure of sentences implies a corresponding knowledge of the composition of thoughts; that he who learns words must necessarily learn their meanings, and must therefore deal with ideas and truths; and that he who translates from a foreign language composes in his own;-whoever reflects upon all this, and then remembers that Thought and Speech are the great elements of human power and influence, will certainly not conclude that the study of language is an unnecessary or useless branch of learning. Finally, in reply to the question under discussion, I affirm that every argument that is used to prove the value of common school education weighs, with increased force, in favor of higher education, and compels the conclusion that education should be limited only by the ability of the parent or society to afford it, and by tho child's capacity to receive it 8. One other form of these popular errors demands a passing remark. It is that of restricting education to the fancied future wants of the pupil. "I intend my boy for a farmer, and therefore he does not need much education," is language not unfrequently heard. The lack of wisdom in this decision is too obvious to need much argument; for who can foresee the vicissitudes of life? You design your son to be a farmer. God may design him to be a lawyer or a law-maker. Franklin's father would have made his son a tallow chandler; Providence made him a statesman and a philosopher. Washington was educated as a surveyor. God made him the savior of his country and its first President. Lincoln was brought up as a farmer; he has become the chief magistrate of the nation in the most trying . time in its history. The world is full of such changes of state and employment. Merchants become farmers, and farmers merchants. Laborers become lawyers, mechanics sit in councils of state, rich men's sons become poor, and poor men's sons acquire wealth. Let education therefore be as broad and general as possible. Knowledge, discipline, strength,-these are useful in every calling, and he who has these will easily fit himself for any work or station. But the argument goes' further than this: for not for his calling but for himself should a boy be educated: not to make him a skillful farmer, but to make him a strong and wise and skillful man. Secure to him a full grown and noble manhood, and he will grace every station and be ready for every duty. These popular objections to education, springing as much, perhaps, from the avarice which grudges the expense of obtaining it, as from the ignorance that misconceives its nature and uses, are the fatal mildews that blight much of the fruit of our school system. They are the secret sources of the too common apathy of parents in regard to the education of their children, and of districts towards their schools. It is unbelief, not merely indifference, which lies at the bottom of that coldness and neglect, of which zealous teachers and school officers so often com plain. Let parents clearly see that wealth and honor and happiness for their offspring, are to be a hundred fold more certainly and more easily secured by education than by any inheritance they can treasure up for them; let them be fully convinced that by withholding education they are condemning their children to imbecility and hardship-to a life-long sense of inferiority and shame-to a conscious subservience in opinions and influence to their better educated comrades-let them be brought to see and feel that they are robbing their own offspring of their noblest birth-right-the right to a share in the soul-riches of knowledge and power-in that subtle but substantial wealth of ideas which alone lifts the civilized man above the savage-let them know and feel all this, and they will sooner cut off their right hands than commit so gross and irreparable a wrong to the souls of their little ones. A man is a monster, not a man, who, with a full knowledge of the fact, can deliberately consign his unoffending children to a life of ignorance and inferiority, while he has the power to prevent it. Convince him of the real value and vital need of education and he will grudge no expense, and spare no pains, to keep his children in school, and procure for them the best of teachers. So, also, let us once fully arouse the public mind, in any district, to the great importance of training up every child to virtue and intelligence-let us show men how closely the value and security of property depend on this intelligence and virtue— how the security of life and liberty depend on them--and what woes and perils are hidden under the vice and ignorance of an uneducated population-what riots and rebellions are ever ready to spring up from them-let all this but fully loom up before the eyes of men, and we shall have no more need to complain of public apathy, or public opposition to the schools. The progress of these schools would be watched with the intensest interest, and no effort or expense would be refused to make them more efficient and useful. It is evident, therefore, that in any efforts to improve our school system, and give it a wider success, we must take into close account this element of the popular will and feeling. To provide better schools for a people who do not wish for education, is as useless as to spread a feast for those who are not hungry, or who have no taste for the viands you have prepared, save that good schools may help to correct public feeling and create the appetite. From this it follows that in any reforms in the school laws we should look to the effect of such reforms on the public mind, as well as to the effect upon the schools. Those agencies are best which work outside as well as inside the school houses. The State Teachers' Institutes have hence proved most valuable agencies for promoting sound educational feeling; and one of the strongest arguments for the county superintendency is its adaptation to influence the public sentiment. Giving, as it would, a good educational lecturer and laborer to each county, it could not but arouse the public mind to a deeper interest in the work of the schools. In Massachusetts, a State lecturer is employed in addition to the State Superintendent, to visit and address the people of the several towns and counties. It would be no unwise investment to employ such an agent in this State, if a suitable man could be obtained. We owe our success thus far much more to the spirit of our people than to any abstract excellency in our school system, and all future successes must spring from the same source. THE UNIVERSITY. The annual report of the Regents, embraced in the appendix, will communicate the statistics for the past year, of the work of the University. The agitations that disturbed its peace a year ago have mostly subsided, and the era of good feeling seems to be rapidly returning. In making this last official notice of it, I cannot refrain from exhorting the people of the State of whatever party or creed, to rally around this our chief seat of learning, and to watch over it with the most generous care. An institution with an endowment of half a million, and an annual income of over forty thousand dollars, is an agency of tremendous power for weal or woe, and as each year adds to the lengthening line of its alumni, it must cast its shadow wider and wider over our affairs. If it shall be made the bone of contention between rival parties, in church or state, seeking to use and control it for partizan ends, then will its influence be baneful and blighting. But if it can remain, as it has been for several years past, an object of generous pride to men of all parties, then it will abide a glory and a blessing to the State. Let us continue to feel that it belongs to us all-to us and to our children; let us see to it that it is well supplied with earnest, christian teachers; that while the hundreds of our young men who annually crowd its halls, find there the noblest lights of learning, they shall also be surrounded with high and active moral and religious influences which may not only save them from taint of vice, but may fill them with the purest inspirations of virtue, and return them to their friends and society the trained soldiers of all that is lovely and of good report among men. Whatever interest any of us may have in the other colleges of the State, we ought not to forget to watch over this great common institution with a most earnest solicitude and care. Its purity and prosperity are alike dear to us all; its influences are too mighty to be neglected; its blessings are too manifold and great to be despised. The State itself gathers lustre from the fame of its great University, and every educational interest among us feels the impulse of its influence. If pure, we shall all bask in its radiance; if it shall become corrupt we shall all feel its malignant sway. Let all it needs for its continued growth and prosperity be freely given it, and let no childish fears of sectarianism deter from making it earnestly and boldly christian. The reports show an attendance, the last year, in the several departments, as follows: |