REMARKS

AT A HEARING BEFORE THE

JOINT COMMITTEE OF EDUCATION,

1 FEBRUARY, 1848,

IN AID OF

THE MEMORIAL OF THE COLLEGES.

CAMBRIDGE:

METCALF AND COMPANY,

PRINTERS TO THE UNIVERSITY.

1848.

REMARKS.

At the commencement of the session of the legislature, the following memorial was presented to the two Houses :

To the Honorable the Senate and the House of Representa

tives of the Commonweath of Massachusetts, in General Court assembled, the Memorial of the President and Fellows of Harvard College, and the Presidents and Trustees of Williams and Amherst Colleges, respectfully shows:

That while, at all periods of the history of the Commonwealth, the perception of the value of knowledge and intellectual cultivation has led the people, in their public and private capacities, "to cherish the interests of literature and the sciences, and all seminaries of them," there is yet reason to think that the general estimate of the importance of education, in the widest sense, has scarcely kept pace with the proofs which have been given of its vast benefits. The experience of the few last years, however, has done much to expand the views of mankind everywhere on the subject, and particularly in some of the leading States of our own country; and your memorialists persuade themselves that the people of Massachusetts will not be found behind those of any other portion of the globe in their desire to extend the advantages of mental culture as widely and thoroughly as possible. The legislature at every period has done much, and private persons in every part of the Commonwealth have also done much, to prove that they were prepared to make great efforts