Thus following up the New England idea of pure, democratic republican education, we arrive at the necessity of free National Universities.

The number of these Universities may be two or ten according to the needs of an increased population.

The establishment of a national system of education would not change the system of free schools existing in New England. Colleges, uniting in the system, would not lose any of their rights or powers; but would be strengthened and expanded as state banks are by becoming national ones.

We invite the reader to look at this great subject, not from the angle of New York or Massachusetts only, but from that of Texas, Oregon, Missouri, Virginia, California, and the Southern Republics.

LOYAL PUBLICATION SOCIETY,

863 BROADWAY.

No. 86.

SOME REASONS

FOR THE

IMMEDIATE ESTABLISHMENT

OF A

NATIONAL SYSTEM OF EDUCATION

FOR THE UNITED STATES.

NATIONAL Systems of education have been established by the most enlightened nations of Europe with entire success; and the more we study those of Prussia, Holland, France, Baden, Switzerland, Bavaria, and others, the more we find them to be the results of experience, wisdom, patriotism, humanity, and religion. We do not, therefore, propose any experiment in the United States. We have no taste for dreams in education or legislation. We wish to go by facts; solid, well-attested facts; facts which have long existed, and which have produced positive, tangible, and all-important results. The march of events called the European systems into existence; the unparalleled march of events and concurrence of circumstances, in the United States, call with double emphasis for a similar movement among us. There can be no risk in our adopting the European philosophies of national education; and when those philosophies have been fully Americanized by us, they will reveal a system of universal and free culture, whose vastness, power, and importance, have never been witnessed.

Some of the profoundest minds and the best patriots in the

United States think the time has come for the introduction of a national system among us, founded upon the eternal principles of democratic republicanism and true religion. With our experience of free schools we can organize a national system as much superior to those in Europe as our iron-clads are superior to their wooden ships.

Let us now look at some of the European systems. Take that of Prussia.

Prussia has an area of one hundred and eight thousand square miles, divided into eight provinces, containing seventeen millions of inhabitants.

The different grades of schools are as follows:

1. The Elementary Schools, which answer to our common public schools.

2. High Schools for business education after the elementary instruction is finished.

3. Gymnasia, for those who are to enter college.

4. Normal Schools, to teach teachers how to teach.

5. Universities, for the highest branches of science and literature, and for the learned professions.

These educational institutions are designed for all the people, and are equally scattered over the whole country.

There are other schools which have particular objects in view; these are

1. Infant Schools for indigent and orphan children.

2. Female Working Schools, where needlework is taught. 3. Manufacturers' and Mechanics' Schools, where the sciences most used in their trades are taught.

4. Military Schools, for the preparation of officers.

The governmental supervision of the whole and its parts, is as follows:

1. The King, who takes a constant interest, and to whom all subordinates are strictly responsible.

2. Secretary of Public Instruction, who, with his Council, regulates the whole school establishment.

3. School Board and School Examiners in each province. These superintend the schools in each of the provinces, and each province has a university.

4. President of Regencies.-There are twenty-eight regencies; that is, each province is so subdivided. A president and his council superintend each one regency, and are responsible to the provincial Board, to which they must report.

5. These regencies are again subdivided into circles; and each circle is superintended by a governmental inspector. These circles have normal schools for the supply of teachers.

6. The last division is into parishes. In each of these parishes there is a school committee, who have the immediate cognizance and superintendence of all school matters, and who are responsible to the circle of inspectors.

Thus, from the king downward to the parish committee, there is a regular gradation of officers; every class and profession having its place in the general organization, and each responsible to the next above him, and all paid by govern

ment.

The end of the entire organization seems to be, to leave details to the local powers, and to reserve to the minister and his council the direction and general impulse given to the whole.

The pecuniary support of the schools and universities is well provided for. The government supports the universities and all the large model schools; but the parish schools are supported, as in New England, by a tax on the whole population.

"Our principal aim," says one of their annual reports, "in each kind of instruction is, to induce the pupils to think and judge for themselves. Teaching what is practical we consider of the first and highest importance."

The results of this beautiful and Christian system of education in Prussia, are apparent to every critical eye. M. Victor

Cousin, the first scholar in France, was sent by his king, Louis Philippe, to Prussia, to examine their educational establishments and report in print. He performed his duty with singular ability and success. He says:

"I left Prussia with a mind full of respect for a government and a people, who had carried the means of universal education to such elevation. There does not exist a single human being throughout Prussia who does not receive an education sufficient for the moral and intellectual wants of the laboring classes."

Here then is a system of national education in which every child from five to fifteen years of age, is obliged to be in school, where each child is taught by purposely-prepared teachers; then severally examined by a Board of Examiners, appointed by government, and then each one reported to the Minister of Public Instruction at Berlin, just as every letter in the United States mail is reported to the Postmaster General at Washington.

The success and popularity of the Prussian national system of education is owing mainly to the endowments and fidelity of the teachers. Mr. Kay, an intelligent English gentlemen, has lately taken great pains by personal examinations, to understand the Prussian system, and he says:

During my travels in different provinces in Prussia, I was in daily communication with the teachers. I could not but feel how grand an institution this great body of more than twenty-eight thousand teachers was, and how much it was capable of effecting; and when I regarded the happy condition of the Prussian peasantry, I could not but believe I saw some of the fruits of the daily labors of this enlightened, respected, and united brotherhood.

"The national system has the respect, confidence, and love of the people; and there is no tax paid so cheerfully as the school tax."

Now look deeply into these facts. Is there not a moral sublimity in this picture-a powerful kingdom in the centre of Europe, so interesting itself in a system of national culture as to secure extensive instruction to every child, thus securing