Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

192

THE

CHRISTIAN EXAMINER.

No. XLIII.

NEW SERIES-No. XIII.

MARCH, 1831.

ART. I.1. The Library of Education. Edited by WILLIAM RUSSELL. Vol. I. Containing Some Thoughts concerning Education, by JOHN LOCKE, and A Treatise of Education, by JOHN MILTON. Boston: Gray & Bowen. 1830. 12mo. pp. 317.

2. Account of the Edinburgh Sessional School, and the other Parochial Institutions for Education, established in that City in the Year 1812; with Strictures on Education in general. By JOHN WOOD, Esq. Printed at Edinburgh. Boston: Reprinted by Munroe & Francis. 1830. 12mo. pp. 204.

[ocr errors]

THE first of these volumes is a reprint of works which have been long known to scholars, but not, we presume, very generally read. Milton's Treatise, however, is so short, that, though it well deserves the space which it occupies in this publication, it cannot prove of much practical assistance to parents or teachers. The plan of Locke, in his Thoughts concerning Education,' embraced a greater variety of topics, and amplitude of discussion; and his work ought to be a manual with all who are interested in the important subject of which it treats. Its plain good sense, its lucid order, its excellent morality, make it one of the most valuable works which parent or teacher can read. We know not that we can praise it more highly than by saying, that it is just such a work as we should have expected from John Locke, the gentleman, philosopher, scholar, and Christian.

VOL. X.-N. S. VOL. V. NO. I.

1

The Account of the Edinburgh Sessional School' deserves to become a standard on elementary instruction. It describes with minuteness of detail the results of actual experiment, and it is, which we certainly did not look for, not only a practical, but an entertaining book.

Encouraged by the appearance of these works, we venture to offer some remarks on the worn but not worn-out subject of moral education; for such works would hardly have been published here, if the interest of the community in the subject had ceased.

We have abundant reason for gratitude to Heaven, and to those instruments in the hands of Heaven, our worthy ancestors, for the numerous and excellent institutions of learning, and means of education which we in this country enjoy. For the most part, we evince our gratitude for them by the value which we set upon them; though we are not yet grateful enough, for we do not yet value them highly enough. We do not value them highly enough, because we do not correctly appreciate nor universally understand the great purpose and end of instruction. Many among us are not in the habit of regarding this purpose as a moral purpose, and this end as a moral end. We are afraid that, from the poorest to the richest of us, the mind is considered as the principal object of education, and the information of the mind as education's peculiar and ultimate design. Though there exists very remarkably in our country, or at least in this part of our country, a great desire in parents to secure an education to their children, and a general willingness to spend their money for this gift, yet we believe that it is common for the poor to bestow what means of education they can on their children, under the sole idea of preserving them from the disgrace and the inconvenience of ignorance, and for the rich to furnish their children with every accomplishment which wealth can command, with the predominant impression and hope that they are qualifying them to push their way in the world, and make a figure in the eyes of society. They do not seem to extend their views, or if at all, not with a due anxiety, to that far nobler and more important office of education, which is simply and beautifully described in the words of the prophet Ezekiel. They seem not to apprehend that it confers its best and most finished endowment on their offspring, only when it has taught them 'the difference between

« AnteriorContinuar »