EDUCATION IN RUSSIA AND SWITZERLAND.

anfrequently vicious,-as they are bigoted the extreme to the established religion anan childish ceremonials, and as the generai diffusion of knowledge would strike at the foundation of their ecclesiastical system,-it cannot be supposed that they will show much zeal either in making their scholars liberal and intelligent, or in enlarging and improving the general system of instruction. Several generations must elapse, and numerous and important changes be effected, before we can expect that the great body of the Spaniards and Portuguese can become enlightened and moralized.

Russia. It is only of late years that the attention of the Russian government has been directed to the promotion of education throughout that extensive empire; and several ages will be requisite, before its halfcivilized inhabitants be raised from the state of mental debasement in which they have been so long immersed. During the reign of the late emperor Alexander, Lancasterian schools and other seminaries were established in diferent parts of European Russia, and Bible societies, for distributing the Scriptures among the lower orders, were patronized by the Emperor, Prince Gallitzin, the archbishops, and other distinguished characters. It appears that in the beginning of 1830, the emperor Nicholas gave his sanction to certain regulations, providing for the establishment of primary schools in the several villages appertaining to the crown. The object of these seminaries is to diffuse useful knowledge among the peasantry, and to furnish the villages with individuals who may act as writers. Gratuitous instruction is to be afforded in these schools to youths of not less than eight years of age, in the catechism, reading books and written documents, writing, and the first four operations of arithmetic. The lessons are to open after their return from labour, and to continue until it be resumed; with the exception of Sundays and festivals, they are to occupy four hours a-day. Permission is, however, given to the teacher to assemble his pupils for the purpose of repeating their lessons, even whilst they are working in the fields: but this cannot take place without the consent of the villagers. The expenses of these schools are to be defrayed out of the territorial income of the villages, and the first essays are intended to be made in the governments of St. Petersburg and Pscov.

21

Switzerland.-This country, remarkable for the sublimity of its mountain scenery, the fertility of its vales, and the beauty of its expansive lakes,-is no less remarkable for the means of education it possesses, and the consequent intelligence and moral order of its inhabitants. In this respect, it is scarcely inferior to the best educated countries in Europe. The proportion of the inhabitants undergoing the process of instruction is greater than that of either France, England or Scotland. In the Pays de Vaud, this proportion amounts to one-eighth of the population, which is more than the average of the other countries of Europe, where systems of instruction have been established; so that the inhabitants of this district of Switzerland, have generally been considered by travellers as the most intelligent and the best educated among the European nations.

The celebrated school of Pestalozzi at Yverdun, in the Pays de Vaud, has been visited and celebrated by every traveller. This was among the first seminaries in which the intellectual system was introduced, in which the rationale of every subject taught is explained and illustrated, and the intellectual facultiès stimulated and brought into exercise. It embraces also the plan of mutual instruction, as exemplified in the schools of Bell and Lancaster. The establishment of the School of Industry of M. Fellenberg at Hofwyl, in the Canton of Berne, has also been deservedly celebrated. The object of this seminary is to combine scholastic education with industrious habits, and a knowledge of the best manner of performing mechanical and agricultural operations. Although, at Hofwyl, the principles and practice of Agriculture are the chief objects of attention, yet the general principles of the institution and the mode of instruction might, in towns, he successfully applied to mechanical operations and manufacturing processes of every description. It has given a great impulse to education throughout the country, and has produced some very eminent scholars. Not only the lower classes, but pupils of the highest rank come to this seminary, from Germany, France, England, and other parts of Europe. In most of the cantons, education is a matter of state, persons of the greatest respectability are engaged in the business of instruction, and the arrangements of the system of tuition are under the immediate direction and protection of the government.

(21)

CHAPTER II.

Strictures on the mode in which Education has generally been conducted.

THERE are few subjects which have so frequently engaged the attention of the literary public as the instruction of the young; and yet there is no subject about which so many vague and erroneous notions generally prevail. No term in our language has been more abused and misapplied than that of education. By the great majority of our countrymen it is considered as consisting merely in the acquisition of pronunciation, spelling, and grammar-of writing, casting accounts, and the knowledge of languages; and these acquisitions are considered of value chiefly as they prepare the individual for engaging in certain secular employments, and are instrumental in procuring his subsistence. By others it has been confined to the communication of the elements of thought, and the improvement of the intellect; and, by a comparatively small number, it has been regarded chiefly as the formation of character, and the cultivation of moral habits. But, to neither of these objects is education to be exclusively confined. It consists of a comprehensive and harmonious combination of them all, including every mean and every mode of improvement by which intelligent beings may be trained to knowledge and virtue-qualified for acting an honourable and respectable part on the theatre of this world, and prepared for that immortal existence to which they are destined. It is deeply to be regretted, that, up to the present hour, with a very few exceptions-in an age deemed liberal and enlightened the system on which education has generally been conducted is repugnant to the dictates of reason, inefficient for enlightening and meliorating the human mind, and is little short of an insult offered to the understandings of the young. While almost every initiatory book has for its motto, and every teacher can readily repeat the following lines of Thomson,

.

"Delightful task! to rear the tender thought, To teach the young idea how to shoot,

And pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind," the great objects which education ought to promote have been miserably neglected. A farrago of words has been substituted in the place of things; the elements of language have been preferred to the elements of thought; the key of knowledge has been exhibited instead of knowledge itself; and the youthful mind, at the termination of the

common process of instruction, is almost as destitute of ideas as at its commencement. At that period of life when the minds of the young are beginning to expand-when they ardently thirst after novelty and varietywhen they are alive to the beauties and sublimities of nature, and listen with delight to the descriptions of other countries, and the tales of other times-instead of being gratified with the exhibition of all that is interesting in the scenes of creation and the history of man--they are set down in a corner to plod over unknown characters and strange sounds--no pleasing objects are exhibited to inspire them with delight-their memories are burdened, and even tortured, while their understandings are neglected; and, after many painful efforts, intermingled with cries and tears, while the detested lash is hanging over their heads, they are enabled to repeat, like a number of puppets, their medley of grammar rules, their psalms, their hymns, their catechisms, and their speeches from the English and Roman classics, pouring out their words with a velocity like water bursting from a spout, without a single correct idea connected with their exercises, "understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm."-Hence it has too frequently happened, that the school-room has been viewed as a prison, their teachers as a species of tyrants, and the scholastic exercises in which they are engaged, as repugnant to their natural vivacity, and subversive of their youthful pleasures. Hence they have frequently been driven to the village school, like sheep to the slaughter, and like criminals to a jail, or carried on the shoulders of their companions, amidst cries, and lamentations, and forebodings of punishment.

In seminaries of a higher order than those to which I now allude, five or six years are generally spent in learning the declension of nouns, the conjugation of verbs, and the rules of syntax, and in acquiring a smattering of the Roman classics; while, at the close of this tedious, and to the pupil, revolting process, he retires from the seminary to the shop, the counting-house, or the university, nearly as ignorant of the common phenomena of nature, of the sublime discoveries of modern times, of the principles of the arts and sciences, and the laws of moral action, as he had been born in Patagonia, or in the

DEFECTS IN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.

centre of New Holland. If he has acquired any thing at all, which may be denominated knowledge, it consists chiefly in a jumble of notions about the squabbles of heathen gods and goddesses, detached fragments of Roman history, the Metamorphoses of Ovid, the fictions of Pagan mythology, and the revengeful encounters of destroying armies and ambitious despots. While his mind is familiar with the absurdities and impieties of ancient superstition and idolatry, he not unfrequently quits the scene of instruction as ignorant of the character and attributes of the true God, of the doctrines of the Christian religion, and of the tempers which it inculcates, as if he had been tutored in a Pagan land.

Even in those seminaries which are devoted to the religious instruction of the young, the same absurd and inefficient system to which I have alluded is too frequently acted upon. Instead of exhibiting to the understandings of the young the character and perfections of the Deity, and the truths of Christianity, by familiar and popular illustrations deduced from the economy of nature and the facts of revelation, a great proportion of their Sabbath-school exercises consists in repeating, with a disgusting flippancy and vociferation, their catechisms, psalms, paraphrases, hymns, and Scripture passages, assigned them as tasks, and in listening to the crude expositions of certain abstract theological dogmas, to which they can attach no precise or well-defined notions, and which do not enter into the essence of the Christian system. In certain schools of this description, I have witnessed the attention of the children almost exclusively directed to the mere repetition of the Shorter Catechism, and other compends of divinity, and that, too, in a most inaccurate, irreverent, and vociferous manner, without a single attempt being made to convey any idea to the understanding of the nature of the truths repeated-while the catechumens seemed to be much gratified and relieved in having got their memories disburdened of the ungracious tasks imposed upon them. In other schools, where the teachers had acquired a smattering of systematic theology-after the memorial tasks were dispatched-I have listened to a series of crude dissertations addressed to the young respecting the covenant of works and of grace, predestination, absolute and conditional decrees, faith, the Trinity, and similar topics, together with long-winded exhortations, occasionally intermingled with boisterous and unhallowed threats and denunciations, because the young did not yield a profound attention to such abstract speculations. Yet all this goes by the name of religious instruction; and, when

23

it is found to produce little influence on the
moral conduct of the young, the effect is at-
tributed solely to the corruption of human
nature, and to the withholding of the in-
fluences of Divine grace,-a sentiment which
goes far to attribute to the "Only Wise
God" those effects which are produce ty
the folly and the injudicious schemes of
men.-As it
-As it is painful to exercise the me-
mory to any extent on words unconnected
with ideas, so it frequently happens, that a
disrelish for religion and its services is in-
duced, in consequence of the labour and
drudgery with which they are thus asso-
ciated. In these seminaries, too, the duties
of Christian morality are too frequently
thrown into the side. Christianity is not
a mere theory, but a practical system; for
all its historical details, its doctrines and pre-
cepts, its promises and threatenings, have an
ultimate reference to the regulation of the
tempe and affections, the direction of the
conduct, and to the general renovation of
the moral powers of man, in order to his
preparation for a higher state of moral and
intellectual excellence. And, therefore, it
ought to be one of the grand objects of re-
ligious instruction to cultivate the moral
powers, to direct the temper and affections,
and to show, by familiar illustrations taken
from the scenes of active life, how the prin-
ciples of Christianity ought to operate in
all the diversified circumstances and rela-
tions of society.-But, leaving this topic, in
the mean time, let us attend a little more
particularly to the range of instruction in
our common initiatory schools.

After a knowledge of the characters of the alphabet and of the principal elementary sounds is acquired, the scholar is led through a series of dry and uninteresting lessons and spelling exercises in which his memory and his faculty of pronunciation are solely exercised. The New Testament is next put into his hand, and, after reading a portion of it with great difficulty and awkwardness, and before he is capable of reading one sentence with ease and accuracy, he is introduced to such books as "Barrie's Collection," and "Tyro's Guide," and "Scott's Beauties of Eminent Writers," in which there is scarcely one selection interesting to a youthful mind, or level to its comprehension. But this circumstance seems to be considered by many as a matter of no importance; for it is seldom or never that an attempt is made to convey to the minds of youth the ideas contained in the lessons they read and commit to memory. During these reading exercises, the Shorter Catechisin is put into their hands, in order that its vocables may be committed to memory;

and that, too, at so early a period, that they find the greatest difficulty in mastering the pronunciation of the long and technical terms with which it abounds. Through this ungracious task they struggle, with the greatest refuciance, and generally, too, without annexing a single idea to any of the answers they repeat. They are soon after, perhaps before they are seven years of age, introduced to the study of English grammar; and, after feeling much apathy and not a little disgust at this abstract science, and experiencing many days and hours of ungrateful labour, they are able to repeat a few of its rules, definitions, and declensions. Like so many parrots, they can tell us by rote, what is a verb, an adverb, or a preposition, or that "conjunctions which imply contingency require the subjunctive mood," without understanding what they say, or annexing a clear idea to any of the rules or definitions they repeat. By turning over Scott's or Fulton's Dictionary, they learn that virtue is a noun, because is annexed to it-that, to write is a verb, because v is annexed to itand that from is a preposition, because pre, is annexed to it; but, beyond such reasons they seldom attempt to aspire; and after two or three years' training in such exercises, they know little more of the subject, or of the application of its rules to composition, than when they first commenced. The principal acquisition made, is a facility in finding out words in a dictionary, without any attention being paid to their meaning-an object which may easily be accomplished in a few days. The useful art of writing is next attempted to be taught; and, in most instances, a far greater degree of importance is attached to the acquirement of an "elegant text," or a "fine running hand," than to the cultivation of the moral and intellectual powers, and the acquisition of substantial knowledge.—Arithmet follows in the rear, and the scholar, after hurrying through its four fundamental rules, without any sensible illustrations of the different operations, is exercised in calculations respecting Tare and Tret, Interest and Annuities, the Square and Cube Root, Exchange, Discount and Equation of Payments, before he has the least knowledge of the nature of these transactions; and, consequently, like one walking in the dark, is unable to perceive the drift and tendency of most of his operations, or the foundation of the rules by which he calculates; and hence it happens that, when he actually engages in the business of real life, he has almost the whole of his arithmetical processes to study over again, and to re-investigate the foundations, objects, and principles, of his operations, in their applications to the transactions in which he is engaged.

In fine, during the whole of the process

On

now described, the moral powers of the young are in a great measure overlooked, and the business of moral tuition shamefully neglected. To improve their tempers and affections, and to bend them into that direction which will tend to promote their own happiness and that of others, is considered as a matter of inferior moment, in which teachers are very little, if at all, interested. It forms, at least, no promiment object, in our schools, to meliorate the tempers of the young, to counteract the principles of malice, envy, and revenge-to inspire them with kindness and benevolenceand to train them to moral excellence. the contrary, the mode in which they are treated has frequently a tendency to produce obstinacy, dissimulation, superstition, pride, hatred, and disaffection. The spirit of unchristian emulation, contention, and revenge is indirectly fostered by the books they read, the discipline by which they are trained, the amusements in. which they indulge, the false maxims and pagan sentiments which are interwoven through the whole course of their education, and by the admiration which is attempted to be excited in their breasts for barbarous heroes and the butchers of mankind. The active powers of the young being thus allowed to take the natural bent of their depraved inclinations, selfishness, pride, malice, and other malignant passions, are allowed to spring up and flourish, without feeling the force of those salutary checks which might impede their progress, or destroy them in the bud; and thus perverse habits and dispositions are induced, which "grow with their growth, and strengthen with their strength," till at length they display themselves with diabolical energy in the scenes of domestic life, and on the theatre of the political world. amidst the contentions of communities and "the tumults of the people."

Such is the amount of the education which the great mass of our population receive prior to their entrance on the scene of active life. To affirm that it is attended by no beneficial effects, would be to fly in the face of all observation and experience. It prepares the mind, in some measure, for certain avocations in civil society, and for the reception of knowledge in after life, should it ever be exhibited in a more judicious and intelligent manner; and, in some instances, when combined with judicious domestic instruction, it will assist and direct the pupil, in the pursuit of knowledge and of mental enjoyments. But, considered by itself, as a system of culture for rational and immortal beings, in order to the development of their moral and intellectual powers, and as a preparation for a higher state of existence, it is miserably deficient, both in the means which are employed, in the range

tion. What important purpose can be gained by a number of boys and girls spending a series of years, in pronouncing, like so many parrots, a number of articulate sounds, to which they annex no corresponding ideas or impressions, and which cost them so much pain and anxiety to acquire? What is the use of the art of reading, if it be not made the medium by which knowledge and moral improvement may be communicated? And, if we neglect to teach youth to apply this mean to its proper end, while they are under regular tuition, how can we reasonably expect, that they will afterwards apply it, of their own accord, when a sufficient stimulus is wanting? By neglecting to connect the acquisition of useful information with the business of elementary instruction, we place the young nearly in the same predicament as we ourselves should be placed, were we obliged, from day to day, to read and repeat long passages from the writings of Confucius, the Alcoran of Mahomet, or the Shasters of Bramah, in the Chinese, the Turkish and the Hindoo languages, while we understood not the meaning of a single term. And how painful and disgusting should we feel such a revolting exercise!-The consequence of this absurd practice is, that, instead of exciting desires for further acquisitions in learning,-in a majority of instances, we produce a disgust to every species of mental exertion and improvement; instruction becomes unpleasant and irksome, both to the teacher and the scholar; the child leaves school without having acquired any real knowledge, and destitute of any relish for it, and seldom afterwards makes any use of the instructions he received for the further cultivation of his mind in wisdom and virtue. To this cause, perhaps, more than to any other, is to be attributed the deplorable ignorance which still pervades the mass of our population, notwithstanding the formal process of instruction they undergo,-and the little relish they feel for devoting their leisure hours to the improvement of their minds, and to those pursuits which are congenial to rational and immortal natures.

of instruction, and in the objects which it is calculated to accomplish.-To illustrate this position is the object of the following remarks. I In the first place, one glaring defect which runs through the whole system of initiatory instruction (except in very rare instances) is that no attempt is made to convey ideas to the youthful mind, along with the elementary sounds of language and the art of pronunciation. Provided children can mouth the words, and vociferate with alacrity the different sentences contained in their lessons, it appears to be a matter of little importance in the eyes either of teachers or of parents, whether or not they appreciate the meaning of any one portion of the sentiments they read. Although the great object of education is "to teach the young ide how to shoot." it is almost the only object which is thrown into the shade; and those scholastic exercises which are only the means of education, are almost exclusively attended to as if they were the end. The young are thus treated as if they were only so many puppets, placed on a stage to exhibit a series of mechanical movements, and as if they were not possessed of the smallest portion of intellect, and were entirely destitute of affections and passions. Yet, it is undeniable, from fact, that children, at a very early age, are capable of receiving a variety of ideas into their minds, and of exercising their reasoning powers respecting them. Present an engraved landscape to a boy of four or five years of age, especially as exhibited through the Optical Diagonal Machine, where he will see every object, in its true perspective as it appears in nature-he will at once recognize and describe, in his own way, the houses, the streets, the men, the women, the roads and carriages, and the land and water of which it is composed, and express his opinion respecting them. Present well-executed engravings of a horse, a cow, a lion, an clephant, or a monkey, and he will soon learn to distinguish the one from the other, and will feel delighted with every new exhibition that is made to him of the objects of nature or of art. And, therefore, if sensible objects, level to his capacity and range of thought, and with which he is in some measure acquainted, were uniformly exhibited in his first excursions in the path of learning, his progress in knowledge would nearly correspond to his advancement in the art of spelling and pronunciation. The absurdity of neglecting the cultivation of the understanding, in the dawn of life, and during the progress of scholastic Not to mention the dry and uninteresting instruction, however common it may be, is so lists and details contained in most of our obvious and glaring, that it scarcely requires a spelling-books, and the vague and sombre process of reasoning to show its irrationality, moral instructions they exhibit-let us fix if we admit that the acquisition of knowledge our attention, for a moment, on the general ought to be one of the great ends of educa- train of subjects contained in "Barrie's Col

II. Another defect which pervades the whole systern of scholastic instruction in our country, and of which the former is a native consequence, 'is, that there is scarcely one of our elementary books adapted to the capacities of youth, and calculated to excite their attention and affections, by its interesting and instructive details.