xt79kd1qg66p https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt79kd1qg66p/data/mets.xml Caldwell, Charles, 1772-1853. 1836  books b92-217-30936367 English Intelligencer Print., : Lexington, Ky. : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Education. English language. Thoughts on popular and liberal education  : with some defence of the English and Saxon languages : in the form of an address to the Philomathean Society of Indiana College, delivered September 28th, 1836 / by Charles Caldwell. text Thoughts on popular and liberal education  : with some defence of the English and Saxon languages : in the form of an address to the Philomathean Society of Indiana College, delivered September 28th, 1836 / by Charles Caldwell. 1836 2002 true xt79kd1qg66p section xt79kd1qg66p 

                THOUGH TS



                      ON




POPULAR AND LIBERAL EDUCATION,



               WITH f031d DEFENCE OF




    THE ENGLISH AND SAXON LANGUAGES,




IN TIHE FORM OF AN ADDRESS TO THE PIILOMATIIEAN SOCIETY
              OF INDIANA COLLEGE;



        DELIVERED SEPTEMBER 28TH, 1836.



     BY CHARLES CALDDWELL, M. D.







          PRINTED BY REQUEST OF THE SOCIETY.



LEXINGTON, KY.
INTELLIGENCER PRINT.
    1836.

 This page in the original text is blank.

 

THOUGHTS



                            o0

 POPULAR AND LIBERAL, EDUCATION,


                      &c. &c. &c.

  GENTLEMEN:-It has been your pleasure to honour me with
an invitation, very flatteringly communicated to participate in
the ministry of this Festival of Letters. Pursuant to that ac-
tion on your part, I now rise, on mine, with such resources as
I can bring to the task, to redeem the pledge, which my accept-
ance of the proffered invitation implied. In the discharge of
this duty, I feel it incumbent on me, to conform, as far as prac-
ticable, to the spirit of the occasion wihich has called us to-
gether. That spirit, as just intimated, is literary and scientific;
andi as such I shall regard it.
  Education has been the principal business of your lives, and
of the lives of those associated with you in the celebration of
your anniversary; education has called us into this sanctua-
ry of the Muses; the patrons of education have assembled
at the summons; and every thing around us is redolent of ed-
ucation. It se'ms proper therefore that it should constitute
the theme of the discourse I am to deliver. Nor, in the en-
tire circle of earthly concerns, vast and multifarious as they
are, can another to equal it in importance be selected. In the
grandeur and sacredness of its object, the mightiness of its
power, and the magnitude of its effects, it is unrivalled and
alone.
  Extravagant as this representation may appear, to those
who have not duly considered the subject, and unwelcome as
it may possibly be to the self-esteem of others, who are en-
gaged in pursuits which they think outrank education-not.

 
4



withstanding these and all other considerations that may array
themselves against it, the statement submitted to you is true to
the letter. And I am the more resolved to defend its truth,
on account of the opposition in sentiment it so uniformly and
illiberally encounters. Neither is education itself, nor the able
and accomplished conductors of it in our country, held in that
high esteem, nor elevated, in public opinion, to that distin-
guished rank, to which they are entitled. There are Jack
Cades in America, as well as in Europe, and at the present, no
less than in former titnes; who, to propitiate the untaught mul-
titude towards themselves, and prejudice them against the more
cultivated and enlightened, exult in their own uneducated con-
dition, decry the fruits of education in others, and endeavour to
make a glory of their shame, by converting their illiteracy into
a stepping-stone to power. Nor is this all. The statesman
and the lawyer, the physician, the divine, and even the mer-
chant and the planter consider themselves and their callings
superior to the teacher and his calling-though they are noth-
ing in fact but the creatures of education. In the practical
pursuit of his profession, the teacher moulds and fashions them,
as the sculptor does his marble, or the potter his clay. Nor
have they a shadow of ground for preferring their vocations
to his, but because they are less laborious, and more lucrative.
That they are either more honourable in their nature, more
weighty and responsible in the duties they impose, or more
useful in their effects, they will not contend. That I may
not, however, commence my discourse with a position deem.-
ed doubtful by any one, it is requisite that I adduce a few
facts in its defence. It will be borne in mind, that, in the re-
marks I have already made, as well as in those I am about to
make, I allude to education in the full and entire signification
of the term. Enlightened and cultivated mind, and acquired
dexterity of every description, are essentially its products.
  The paramount "grandeur of the object" of education just
referred to is incontestible; becauserit is nothing less, than to
rescue the human family from the ignorance and ferocity, de-
gradation and profligacy of brutish savagism, and exalt them to

 5



civilization, science and virtue. And this, neither legislators
nor lawyers, physicians nor divines, are able in their special
vocations to effect. The "mightiness of the power" of educa-
tion is evinced by its achievement in part of this arduous en-
terprise. And the "magnitude of its effects" is sufficiently
demonstrated, by all that is vast, magnificent, and glorious, in
the works of civilized and cultivated man, which are exclu-
sively its offspring-by productions in poetry and philosophy,
history and eloquence, radiant ill all that genius can impart;
by the pyramid and the column, the "soleirmn temple" and the
"gorgeous palace;" by the "cloud-capt tower," the perforated
mountain, the excavated lake and river, and the wonders of
navigation by wind and by steam-these and the innumerable
sublime and exquisite creations of painters and musicians,
sculptors and other artists, sufficiently attest the mightiness of
education. And they are so many stars of the highest order
and brightest emblazonry, in the heraldry of the teacher. So
powerful indeed is education in the work of improvement, that
it is second only to Creative Power, in making the most illus-
trious of our race what they are. It completes what Creative
Power had only begun. From the universality and absolute-
ness of its dominion over human affairs, it may be regarded as
the Vicegerent of the Deity on earth. Without it, man would
be one of the most vile and ferocious, yet helpless and misera-
ble of sublunary beings. With it, he is "monarch of all he
surveys."
  To form yet a more clear and definite conception of the
sway of education over the character and destiny of human
beings, compare the Laplander or the Kamschadale, the Bos.
cheseman or the Papuan, with the highly cultivated European
or American; and mark the issue. The difference in intellect
and efficiency, morals, manners, and corporeal attributes, be-
tween those members of the human family, you will find to be
striking even to amazement-may appearances be trusted,quite
as great, as that between the uncultured savages, and the mis-
shapen Golok or Wild Man of the woods. And this difference,
I say, is in no small degree attributable to the influence of

 
                           6
teachers. Yet in this comparison, neither is educationperfect
in the European or the American (for it may be still improved
in them.) nor altogether wanting in the beings contrasted with
them. The absolute debasement, therefore of uneducated
nman, and of course the utmost potency of that agent, which,
from such deep degradation raises him to such a height in the
scale of existence are hitherto unlinowvn to us.
  But to understand the power of education in its entire ex-
tent, and iil all its modes and Iorms of influence, we must take
a different and less restricted view of it. We must contem-
plate it in its action, not on individuals, and at given times, but
on communities and nations, and at all tinmes; and on the world
in the aggregate. Under this aspect of the inquiry, adverting
in retrospect to a far distant period, the mystical grandeur of
Egypt and the wonders of ancient Persia and Palestine, the
glories of Greece and the mightiness of Rome, present them-
selves as a few of the trophies of education. Compare these
with the portentous gloom of the Dark Ages, which, like a
second chaos, overspread the earth, when education and its
products lay prostrate under the tread of the Goth and the
Vandal-and the contrast is rich in instrue ion, and interest. As
the noon-day brightness of the sun, suddenly extinguished in a
total eclipse, testifies to the loveliness and value of light in the
material world, so did the nightfall of the Dark Ages in the
world of the inind. And rs the departure of the sun from the
heavens summons to their banquet of blood the monsters of the
forest, so did the going down of the sun of education awaken
to the work of desolation and ruin, that fiercer and more insa-
tiate monster, UNCULTIVATED MAN.
   Descending through later ages t- the present era, take a
survey of the globe by lancimnd by water, and mark how it is
studded, and ornamented, and changed, by the miracles of ed-
ucation. No tongue can describe, no pencil paint, nor scarce-
ly can the most vigorous fancy conceive, the differences in
science and sound government, civilization,moral order, litera-
ture, and the arts, between France and Great Britain now,
and at the time when they were subjugated by the legions of

 
                             7
Cwsar. From those nations have issued streams of living light
and knowledge, and other prodigies of mind, which nothing
can extinguish or destroy, short of the wreck of the earth which
they adorn. The fearful grandeur and consolidated power of
Prussia. Austria, and Russia, more especially the latter, form
another monument of the sway of education, to which anti-
quity had nothing to compare. Before the military array of
those nations, educated as they nowv are, Alexander and his
Macedonians, Czesar and his cohorts, would have been but
stubble in the fire, or chaff before the storm. Nor is our own
country without her wonders from the same source. WNithin
the last two hundred years, education has perhaps done more
for the glory and happiness of the New World, than even of
the Old,
  When our forefathers arrived on the shores of the country
they had selected as their home, they encountered but a wilder-
ness; where the lights of intellectual, a!.d the sobrieties and
courtesies of moral and social nature were unknown and d:sre-
gardld; and which was trodden only by the savage and his
prey. But, since that period, marvels of improvement, of
every description, have followed each other, with a rapidity
and constancy of march, and have spread abroad through the
land, with a width of diffusion, which superstition, in former
times, would have ascribed to agencies higher than human.
Of these multiplied products of education in our country, the
most striking and stupendous were the war of the Revoluti-,n,
and the formation and establishment of the Federal Govern.
ment. With them, considered in their principles, economy,
and relations, the world presents nothing in the same line,
that will bear a comparison. In their display of courage and
fortitude, wisdom, talent, and moral grandeur, they far surpass
all other similar achievements that history records. Other Re-
volutions indeed, in other lands, have rolled their bloody
rounds; and other forms of government have been erected on
the ruins of preceding ones; but nothing like those of the
United States, have been presented to the admiration and
wonder of our race. And, I repeat, that they are the offspring
of all-controlling education.

 
'S



   Here a question vitally important, not only to ourselves, but
 to the citizens of all free governments now existing, or to exist
 hereafter, presents itself for solution. Has education comple-
 ted its work in the United States Has it so far enlightened
 the intellects, and improved and confirmed the morals of the
 people, as to fit them for the enjoyment and exercise of the
 privileges they posscsF,unde r the institutions that have descend-
 ed to them from their fathers  In simpler language; has it
 fully prepared them for that great work of sovereignty, the
 highest of social and political achievements, the task of self-
 government  Interestinc as this question is, as a mere theme
 of inquiry, and momentous as is its qffirmatire to our individual
 rights and immunities, and our national welfare, a decided nega-
 tive is the only reply, that truth can sanction or honesty
 render. A; a people, are are not educated in a degree corres-
 ponding to the privileges we enjoy, and the duties they impose
 on us. Those privie ges therefore will be forfeited and lost,
 unless the caste of our education be greatly improved. Of the
 truth of this prediction, evidence crowds on us in a ratio fear-
 fully increasing with the progress of time. Nothing can save
 us from the fate of all Republics that have gone before us-
 corruption, misrule, anarchy, anId despotism-but improve-
 rnent by education in our intellects and morals. History warns
 us, that they fell for want of this; and so shall we-an event as
 unquestionable, and as directly the product of a law of nature,
 now in operation, as that the approaching winter will strip
 your magnificent forests of their leaves, ani your prairies of
 their verdure-unless, I say, the catastrophe be averted by the
 agency referred to.
 Does any one reply to me, that this is but empty prophesy-
 as groundless and visionary, as it is gloomy and disheartening
 -that sixty years ago our liberties were won for us, by the
 swords of our fathers-and that we are as resolutely deter-
mined, and as amply prepared to maintain them now, as were
the heroes and patriots of SEVENTX-SIX, with Franklin, and
Hancock, and Washington at their head-that, enjoying as
we do, the franchise of electing our public servants, and in-

 


structing and controlling them, in the discharge of their du-
ties, our freedom and its concomitant privileges are secure;
and that therefore all apprehension and gloomy foreboding in
relation to them are imaginary and futile Is such the answer
prepared by any one to the remarks here submitted to you
  My rejoinder is simple, and, I trust, satisfactory. The
danger arrayed again, t the liberties of our fathers in 1776 was
totally different from that which threatens ours in 1836; and
much less insidious and likely to destroy. The danger then was
open assault and violence from without; and the eye could des-
cry, and the sword repel it. But the danger now, assuming no
visibleshape,is fromeraft, intrigue,and corruption within;which
nothing but intelligence and virtue can resist-an ampler meas-
ure of those protective qualities,I am compelled to add, than is
possessed, at present, by the general population of the U. States.
  Let me entreat you to understand me, as not addressing you
thus, in the spirit, or with the feelings of a political partisan.
Far from it. An act of the kind would be as indelicate and
unbecoming in me, as it svould be unworthy of you, and of the
occasion we celebrate. I speak of the political condition of
our country, not merely as it now is, but as I know it to have
been for the last thirty or forty years. No administration of our
government is, more than another, exempt from the charge,
except the administration of Washington, which was alone
paternal and patriotic, virtuous and pure,-founded in wisdom
and conducted in the spirit of rectitude and honour-alone
free from the sordidness of self, the injustice of favouritism,
and the plague-spots of party. The reason is plain. No more
could coiruption or intrigue, or any form of dishonesty, polit-
ical or moral, subsist under the frown of the Chief Magistrate
then in power, than can the pestilent vapour endure the radi-
ance of the mid-day sun! The lightning of his eye was as fatal
to them, as had been that of his sword to the enemies offreedom.
Nor did the boldest partisan dare to approach him with an un-
hallowed request,to procure the promotion of the incompetent or
the unworthy. HE was truly PRESIDENT of the United Statas,
above parta influence and ftelings, doing justice to all, and fa-

 

                              10
vors to none-and aiming exclusively at the welfare of his country.
His successors in office (in standing and virtue, he has had no
successor) have. been but the chiefs of parties--upheld by their
trains of feudal retainers, whom they have rewarded or their
services by appointment and place!
   As respects the subsequent a dministrations, the charge just
preferred is true; s 9me of them heing more deeply amenable
to it than others. And faithful history will say hereafter,
whether the evil does not increase with the progress of time.
When one of the heavenly bodies departs frem its track, there
is reason to apprehend that it would tumble into the sun, did
not the others, acting in concert, and co-operating with its
own laws, restore it to its place. In like manner, unless the
influence of education arrest our government in its erratic
career, and replace it in its proper orbit, it will, as already
predicted, plunge through anarchy' into the grasp of despotism.
But to return.
   Did the danger to our liberties, I say, proceed as it did in
SEVE:NTY-SIX, from the bayonets of an external foe, its duration
would be transient, and its issue certain.  It would be met as
couraguously,and repelled as triumphantly, by the heroic spir-
its of the present day, as it was by the INVINCIBLES of our re-
volutionary conflict. For it need not here be told by me, hun-
dreds of welifouglht fields, and blood-red decks having proclaimed
it elsewhere, that Americans always do their duty in battle.
But there is a danger to our freedom, invisible I say to the
physical eye, and immeasurably greater than that of the sword.
It is the danger of intrigue, corruption, and bribery, in some
of the forms they habitually put on, and of the wily and
treacherous practices they pursue. Nor can this be success-
fully opposed by personal bravery, or any thing pertaining to
the profession of arms. It must be met and overthrown by
the resources of education, else its triumph is certain; and des-
pots and their minions, scoffing at our experiment of self-gov-
ernment, and exulting in its failure, will aid in revetting on us
the letters of slavery.
  Prom these remarks on the general power and usefulness

 
                               11
 of education, and its peculiar importance to ourselves, as cit-
 izens of a free representative government, I shall proceed to
 the consideration of the manner and means, by which its ben-
 efits may be most readily secured to us. In other words; how
 it may best be improved in its character, and most readily
 diffused throughout the States of the Union. This view, if
 fully followed out, would eventuate in a scheme of national
 education. But I must not now attempt an entErprise of such
 compass. Even when contracted to its narrowest limits, it is
 still a subject so extensive in its ran-e, and so abundant in mat-
 ter, that I can do nothing more, in the time and space within
 which I must restrict myself, than hastily sketch an outline of
 my opinions. That order and inethod may not be altogether
 wanting in the discussion, education will be considered under
 the usual division of Popular and Liberal-Classical edu-
 cation making a branch of the latter.
   By Popular education, I mean, as you must be aware, that
which is accessible to the people at large, and which many
ol them receive. From  the nature of the case, therefore, it
be neither extensive nor prolound. By Liberal education, that
which is attainable, only, or chiefly, by the wealthier classes.
This, as its dlenomination imports, and as will be made to ap-
pear more fully hereafter, is of a higher order. Which of these
two castes of education is most essential to the public weltare,
is a question I leave to the scrutiny of others. They are both
so essential, that a lack of either can never fail to be pernicious
in its consequences.
   Popular education, I say, belongs more particularly to that
great class of the community, which, from its majority in num-
bers, has the command of social and political power, and is
privileged to delegate it for special purposes. When competent
in amount and sound in condition, it prepares its possessors for
the judicious and successful transaction of private affairs;
and, in the exercise of their public immunities, it enlightens
and directs them, and ministers essentially to their interests
and security. More especially. in the employment of their
elective franchise, it is their buckler and their shield-their

 


most effectual safeguard against the devices and intrigues of de-
magogues, who would mislead therm, and their most trust-
worthy monitor, in the choice of candidates For pubilic stations.
Without it, they are unqualified for such choice, and liable to be
made instruments in the hands of desiuning and unprincipled
men, for the accomplishment of selfish and pernicious ends.
For, in free governments, the illiterate and uninformed are but
ladders for the intriguing to climb into power. And when
their object is attained, they look down in scorn on the dupes,
if they do not spurn them, on whose snoulders they had as-
cended. This truth should be made known to the people in
their youth, as a part of their education, that their pride may unite
with their intelligence, to protect them alike from the insult and
deception, with which they are threatened.
  Though it may not be asserted, that alil who are destitute of
the benefits of a liberal education are unfit for public station,
nor that every one possessing such benefits is fit for it; yet none
will deny, that, other things being equal, the liberally educated
are best prepared for all the higher operations of mind, in pub-
lic as well as in private life. In the United States much more
than in any other country, all offices and appointments are
open alike to men of all forms and degrees, of education-and
even to those who can hardly be said to be educated at all.
Nor is the measure perhaps altogether disadvantageous. It
gives scope for action, in many cases, to genius and laudable
ambition, which they could net hlave had without it, and thus dc-
velops latent powers, which -would otherwvise lie dormant and
be lost to society. That it has also however its concomitant
evils must be obvious to every one. It is the chief source of
the swarms of crafty demagogues aud aspirants to office, that
inundate our country, fan into perpetual flamne the fires of
party, make a business of intrigue themselves and teach it to
others, and breathe but in the atmosphere of discord and strife.
And these flocks of harpies, as foul and detestable as those of
the poet, and of much worse omen, are most fearfully on the
increase. Their number now, compared to that which annoy-
ed us at the commencement of the present century, is proba-
bly in the proportion of a hundred to one. And their skilful-

 


ness in deception and the perpetration of iimischief has augniernt-
ed in perhaps a corresponding ratio. Fromi this condition of
things arises the alarming truth, that the people of the United
States, as a body, are more deeply infected with the spirit of
political ambition, trickishness, and flaud, than any other peo-
ple now in existence-or that ever did exist.
  The very fact, that State preferment is open to every one,
excites hundreds of thousands to aspire to it, and to become agi-
tators and annovers of the cormnmunity, who xould otherwise
pursue some humble but useful v ocation, for which alone they
are fitted by nature. Nor have they a right to aimle at any
thing higher. It is not true, that all men arc born with "cqual
a ights," any more than that they are born with equal talents.
As far as public station is concerned, rights and talents are
the measures of each other. No man has a right to an office'
which he wants talents to administer. Nor can the suffrages
of the people confer on him such a right; because the proceed-
ing is in violation of a law of naliti e, which is tantamount to
the WILL OF GOD. And the aspirants here referred to, being un-
able to succeed in their designs, from a want of strength of
mind and character, united to an entire destitution of personal
worth, have recourse to cunning arid artifice; or, from a
spirit of servility, added to other traits of meanness, become
panders to the ambition of higher and stronger jugglers of
State, and descend to the sycophancy and vileness of parasites
and retainers. In this way is the whole community, I say, be-
comning imbued, to a&fearful extent, with the rank leaven of po-
litical corruption. Nor is all yet told. Of this career of petty
and misplaced aspiration to power, intemperance rarely fails
to be the issue. For the tavern and the dram-shop are the
places of resort of vulgar politicians; where, after having
forged their calumnies, and concerted their plots against the
upright and deserving, they hold high carnival, and celebrate
their orgies. Thus is useful industry abandoned by them, lion-
esty and moral observances neglected or violated, and habits
of dissipation and debauchery formed. And thus do sottish-
ness and beggary prove the lot of some of them, guilt and the

 
                              14
penitentiary of others, and ruin in some shape of nearly all.
buch is and must be the fate of the idle, unprincipled, and
designing, who, pursuing no productive emrployinent them-
selves, and contributing in no shape to the eliare of society,
but disturbing its harmnony by personal slander and party ex-
citement, seek to subsist, by the arts of deception, on the
labour of their fellow men.
  For these evils the only remedy is a system of Popular edu-
cation, wisely planned and digested, fiithfully pursued, and
skilfully executed, and extended throughout the Union. If any
thing should be strictly national, in compass and character,
under a federate and representative government, it is the men-
tal discipline of those who constitute the nation. On no other
principle can union and harmony, order and prosperity be so
certainly attained by them. Discrepant views, jarring inter-
ests, and incongruous elements are klnovwn to be incomlpatiblie
with the wellare of families. And a nation is but a family on
an extended scale.
  But Popular education in the United States, on which the
moral, intellectual, and political soundress of the country so
essentially depends, ia in a deplorable c.ondition. Three or
four States perhaps excepted, this is true of the Union. And
even of the excepted States, it is true to an extent sufficiently
onminous.  She reason is p.ain. Except in the cities, and a
few of the larger towns of the Union, the teachers of primary
schools are as unfit fbio their vocation, as imagination can con-
ceive. Their want of knowledge and letters, manners, dignity,
and character can harily be surpassed. They are therefore
disqualified alike to instruct and govern, set example and com-
mand respect. In truth they are disqualified for every thing
connected with education; because they are wholly uned-
ucated themselves. Too indolent to labour with their hands,
and too ignorant or feeble-minded to be (concerned in bu-
siness where intellect and knowledge are requisite, they be-
come "school-masters," and teach their scholars bad English,
had habits, bad manners, and too often bad morals. I do not
aver that this is the case with ,,ll of them. But I pronounce it

 
                              15
 true of a very large majority of those of them I have personal-
 ly known, or of whose character and standing I have been cor-
 rectlv informed.
   Vitally important to us as Popular education is, it is more
 miserably provided for, than any other form of lousiness in the
 communitv. And we sustain and tolerate more abuses in it,
 than in any other. To this the lowest mechanical trade formns
 no exception. True; large sumls of money are annually ex-
 pended on it, by many of the States. Each State in the Un.
 ion. I believe, possesses its "education fund, and freely disbur.
 ses it, no doubt from patriotic and beneficent motives; and un-
 der the belief that mnuch good is eflected by it. But the money
 thus disposed of is virtually wasted, by being bestowed on
 men, who do little or nothing in return for it-many of whonm
 indeed do miore harmrn than good-for bad teaching is worse
 than no teaching at all; error, prejudice, and incorrect practices.
 being its principal products.
 To an extent so amazing is this evil carried, that it is neither
 unfounded nor exLravarant to say, that, in thousands of instan-
 ces, in the United States, much more attention is paid to the
 breeding and imrproveinent of domestic animals, than to the
 education of children. And men are employed to teach the
 latter, who would not be intrusted with the care of the former.
 In a far distant country, it is wvell known that the celebrated
 Oberlin found an ignoramus training children, who had been
 dismissed for incom-ipetency from the supervision of pigs. He
 was unfit to be a swine-herd-the most ignominious of herds-
 men! yet he was teaching human beings! Nor is our own
country free from the disgrace of school-masters equally un-
qual/ificd! The stock-fairs, which abound in our country, may
be offered as evidence, not easily set aside or refuted, that
more solicitude is felt for the improvement of cattle, than for
that of the human race. At those shows, which are instituted
with much pomp, and at no little expense, premiums are
awarded to the breeders of the best horses, cows, mules, sheep,
and other sorts of domestic animals. But no public provisions
are made for doing suitable honors to the best instructors of

 


boys and girls. Suclh I iLean is the neglect of this vital inter-
est through the country at large-laudable exceptions being
found in a few places, where the people are more enlightened,
and mental cultivation more liberally prized. No wonder
then, that Popular education is in so degraded a condition.
  For the lamnentable deficiencies of the teachers of common
country schools, two substantial reasons may be rendered.
As already stated, those teachers are themselves untaught, and
must therefore be deficient; nor are the salaries they receive
sufficiently ample, to secure and reward the services of corn-
petent men. As a general rule, the emoluments of country
"school-masters" are inferior to those of journeymen mechan-
ics; and greatly below the receipts of dram-selling grocers,
pedlars, and overseers. That their abilities are humble, there-
fore, and their performances of little value, is not surprising.
It would be matter of surprise, if the case were otherwise. In
instruction, as in other forms of business, the rank of talents
employed, and the worth of services rendered, are usually
found to bear a fair proportion to the salaries received. And
that it will continue to be so, comports with the principles of
human nature.
  It has been observed that large sums of money have been
expended annually, by most of the States of the Union, on
Popular education. To this may be added, that much time
has been consumed, innumerable Resolutions passed, and vol-
umies of Reports made and published, in devising and inatur-
ing suitable schemyies for that caste of instruction, by Legisla-
tures, societies, and well-meaning and public-spirited individu-
als. And still but little improvement has been made in it.
For this there must be substantial reasons. Nor do they ap-
pear to me to be deeply concealed. When canvasses are held
for the selection of teachers, the choice usually falls, not so
much on those who are best qualified to teach; as on those who
are willing to attempt to teach for the meagerest salaries.
Thus does the process assume a puny, chaffering, "cheap-
shop" character, and, like every other effort, where miserly
meanness usurps the place of liberal economy, terminates in

 
17



diisappointment, it not in soine other more pernicious forni
of mischief. Those again wvhlo have been engaged in prepar-
ing schemies of' education, havee been not only unqualified for
the task, from their deficiency in the knowledge of mental phil-
ostophy; but they have hegun the business at the wrong