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EDUCATION.

The proper Range of Popular Education.

LET us remember for ourselves, and inculcate upon the people, that our progress thus far has but led us to the vestibule of knowledge. When we see the people content in the belief that they know all that is known or is desirable to be known, let us instruct them that there is a science that will reveal to them the hidden and perpetual fires in which are continually carried on the formation and modification of the rocks which compose this apparently solid globe, and from whose elaborate changes is derived the sustenance of all that variety of vegetable life with which it is clothed: that another will disclose to them the elements and properties of those metals which men combine or shape with varied art into the thousand implements and machines by the use of which the forest-world has been converted into a family of kindred nations; that another solicits their attention, while it will bring in review before them, so that they can examine, with greater care and instruction than did their great progenitor in the primitive garden, all the races of animated beings, and learn their organization, uses, and history; that another will classify and submit to their delighted examination the entire vegetable kingdom, making them familiar with their virtues as well as the forms of every species, from the cedar of Lebanon to the humble flower that is crushed under their feet; that another will decompose and submit to their examination the water which fertilizes the earth, and the invisible air they breathe ; will develop the sources and laws of that heat which seems to kindle all life into existence, and that terrific lightning which

seems the especial messenger of Divine wrath to extinguish it. Let us teach that the world of matter in which we live, in all its vast variety of form, is influential in the production, support, and happiness, of our own life, and that it is passing strange, that with minds endowed with a capacity to study that influence and measurably direct it, we yield uninquiringly to its action, as if it were controlled by capricious accident or blind destiny. Shall we not excite some interest, when we appeal to the people to learn that science which teaches the mechanism of our own wonderfully and fearfully fashioned frames, and that other science which teaches the vastly more complicated and delicate structure of our immortal minds? Who would not follow with delight that science which elevates our thoughts to the heavens and teaches us the magnitude, forms, distances, revolutions, and laws of the globes that fill the concave space above us? And who, with thoughts thus gradually conducted through the range of the material universe, would not receive with humility, yet with delight, the teachings of that spirit of divine truth which exalts us to the study of the character and attributes of that glorious and beneficent Being, whose single volition called it all into existence? Let us teach the people all this, and let us show them that, while we sit contentedly in comparative ignorance, the arts are waiting to instruct us how to reduce the weary labors of life; philosophy, how to avoid its errors and misfortunes; and eloquence, poetry, and music, how to cheer its way and refine our affections; and that Religion is most efficient when she combines and profits by all these instructions, to conduct us to happiness in a future state. Above all, let us inculcate that the great and beneficent Being who created us and this material universe, has established between each of us, and every part of it cognisable by our minds, relations more or less intimate; that he has impressed not more on the globes that roll through the infinitude of space than on the pebble that lies beneath our feet-not more on the immovable continent than on the rolling sea-not more on the wind and lightning than on the ethereal mind of man; and not more on the human soul than on the dimly-lighted instinct of the glow-worm, or of the insect visible only by microscopic aid—"laws that determine their organization, their duration, time, place, circumstance, and action;

that for our security, improvement, and happiness, he has subjected these laws to our keen investigation and perpetual discovery; and that, vast as is the range of that discovery, so vast and more extended than we can describe, or can yet be conceived, is knowledge; and that to attain all this knowledge-is Education!"- Address at Westfield, N. Y., 1837.

Popular Education a Leveller.

THE aristocracy with which the world has been scourged was never one that was produced by science and learning. That education increases the power of those who enjoy its advantages is true; and in this best sense is education aristocratic. In this sense, science and learning always will create an aristocracy in every country where they are cherished. Not an aristocracy of birth, for it is education that has exploded among us the prejudice in favor of birth. To it we owe our exemption from the error prevalent all over the rest of the world, that no man is so fit, or so well entitled, to be a king as he who is the son of a king; none so brave as he whose father was a warrior; none so well entitled to the enjoyment of wealth as he whose ancestors were rich. Nor is the aristocracy produced by education that of wealth; for knowledge pays no respect to mere wealth: it humbles all pretensions except those of virtue and intellect. But the aristocracy produced by education is the increased power and influence of the most enlightened, and therefore the most useful, members of society. However repugnant we may be to admit the truth, and however glaring may be the exceptions to it, it is nevertheless a sound general principle that knowledge is power. Whatever there is in our lot that distinguishes us from the disfranchised peasantry of continental Europe, or the turbaned followers of the prophet, or the mutually-warring Africans in their native deserts, or their abject offspring here, or the aborigines of our forests, all is knowledge obtained by education; and, compared with all those classes of our common race, we are aristocratic. We exercise greater power, because we are wiser, and therefore better, than they. In every stage of society this tendency of education has been observed. He who first learned the malleable property of iron, and first shaped the axe and the

ploughshare, became an aristocrat. He who first attenuated and wove the fleece, he who first smoothed and rendered pliable the skins of beasts, he who first erected the rude huts for his tribe

all these, all classes of mechanics, have in their day been, and all who exercise their callings will be, aristocrats. They all exercise an influence, great in proportion to their knowledge. It is inevitable, because it is the wisdom of Providence that the world shall be governed by ascendant minds. Our own observation shows us daily that knowledge gives the capacity for usefulness; and he who is, or is esteemed, useful, is by consent invested with power. In agriculture, he who adds science to labor is an aristocrat, compared with the drudge who performs an allotted task. He who in the mechanic arts adds skill to patient industry, rises instantly above the uninstructed artisan; and he who to industry and skill adds taste, is far above the competition of the dull and plodding workman. If, at this day, wealth sometimes usurps the place of intellect and appropriates its honors, it is only because public sentiment is perverted, and requires to be corrected by a higher standard of education. But, although education increases the power and influence of its votaries, it has no tendency like other means of power to confine its advantages to a small number: on the contrary, it is expansive and thus tends to produce equality, not by levelling all to the condition of the base, but by elevating all to the association of the wise and good. If, then, we would advance popular education, if we would secure the success of our common schools, and extend their advantages to the whole people, we must remember that education is a catholic cause, and must banish all prejudices that retard improvement in any direction.-Address at Westfield, N. Y., 1837.

The Same.

OUR institutions, excellent as they are, have hitherto produced but a small portion of the beneficent results they are calculated to confer upon the people. The chief of those benefits is equality. We do indeed enjoy equality of civil rights; but we have not yet attained, we have only approximated toward, what is even more important-equality of social condition.

From the beginning of time, aristocracy has existed, and society has been divided into classes-the rich and the poorthe strong and the dependent-the learned and the unlearned; and from this inequality of social condition have resulted the ignorance, the crime, and the sufferings of the people. Let it excite no wonder when I say that this inequality exists among us, and that aristocracy has a home even in the land of freedom. It does not, indeed, deprive us of our civil rights, but it prevents the diffusion of prosperity and happiness. We should be degenerate descendants of our heroic forefathers did we not assail this aristocracy, remove the barriers between the rich and the poor, break the control of the few over the many, extend the largest liberty to the greatest number, and strengthen in every way the democratic principles of our constitution.

This is the work in which you are engaged. Sunday schools and common schools are the great levelling institutions of the age. What is the secret of aristocracy? It is, that knowledge is power. Knowledge, the world over, has been possessed by the few, and ignorance has been the lot of the many. The merchant what is it that gives him wealth? The lawyer-what is it that gives him political power? The clergy—what is it that gives them influence so benign for good purposes, so effective for mischievous ends? Knowledge. What makes this man a common laborer, and the other a usurer-this man a slave, and the other a tyrant? Knowledge. Knowledge can never be taken from those by whom it has once been attained; and hence the power which it confers upon the few can not be broken while the many are uneducated. Strip its possessors of all their wealth, and power, and honors, and knowledge still remains the same mighty agent to restore again the inequality you have removed. But there is a more effectual way to banish aristocracy from among us. It is by extending the advantages. of knowledge to the many- -to all the citizens of the state. Just so far and so fast as education is extended, democracy is ascendant.

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I wish you, my fellow-citizens, God speed in your benevolent and patriotic labors. Seldom does it happen to any citizen to render to his country any service more lasting or more effectual than that which is accomplished by the teachers of such schools

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