For the Schoolmaster. The Late Frederick Emerson, Esq. ter that he has lived? It may be answered, that the service he rendered the children of this country in the production of his arithmetics, has been incalculable. The instruction was chiefly oral. He replaced the use of the slate and pencil. His books are admitted to possess great merit. As literary efforts, they are almost unrivalled. His definitions, even, of the four fundamental rules for precision and clearness, are unequalled. THE recent death of this distinguished school-master, seems to call for a notice of his merits as a teacher in educational periodicals. The following sketch of his life and labors, is therefore condensed for the R. I. Schoolmaster, from a feeling tribute to the memory of the deceased, by a member of the Board of School Committee in Boston. Mr. Again, he has given to the world a superior Emerson was born in 1789, in Hampstead, N. system of ventilation. His ventilators owe H. He received the best education to be had their properties respectively to the ascertained at academies in that region. At the age of geometrical forms and proportions in which eighteen, he became a teacher, and taught suc- they are constructed. Their value has been officessively at Deerfield, Hingham and Salem. In cially recognized. They are so common that 1820, he was elected writing-master of the all are familiar with them. Twenty-five thouBoylston school in Boston, and occupied the sand of these mementoes are to-day supplying situation for ten years, when the writing de-an hundred fold that number of human bepartment was abolished. In 1830 his profes-ings with the pure air of Heaven. This last sional life of twenty-three years terminated. title to remembrance is based upon his services But one opinion prevailed, of the way in as member of the School Committee. Pracwhich he discharged the duties of his profes-tically qualified by a service of twenty-three sion, and of the rank he held as a teacher. years as a teacher, he was well able to enThe three years following, he devoted to the lighten and assist. Twenty-one years did he production of his series of arithmetics. He render in this capacity to Boston, a period of served as a member of the school committee devotion to this important duty certainly for twenty years, receiving frequently the sup-worthy of momentary notice. Finally, Mr. port of all parties. For the twelve years pre- Emerson died, with a perfect trust in God, his ceding the last three of his life, he gave him- soul winging its flight as the gray dawn of self up to a thorough investigation of the sci- Sabbath morning was streaking the east, and ence of ventilation. He had his large experi- his friends and associates have an unwavering mental halls and his models. The ventilators faith: so much used are the result of his labors. He was conscientious, truthful, meditative, hence his acts and opinions were as unexceptionable as is consistent with humanity. Tenacious of his opinions, he was invariably slow, thoughtful and studious in arriving at them. Mathematics, Hydrostatics, or Pneumatics, generally provided him with materials for study. He was generous and benevolent. Almost all of a respectable income was distributed noiselessly and unostentatiously, according to the scripture injunction, among those who were in want. He delighted especially to aid those, who, although industrious, were unable to make income equal only. The wood, the flour, and the money forwarded by him, will be missed. He was a religious man, but unsectarian. He loved all mankind. The question may be asked, "Is it, on the whole, bet "That ere the sun in all his state, He passed through glory's morning gate, From the N. Y Quarterly. Women as Conversers. G. H. T. EDUCATION being fairly apportioned, females are better conversers than men. They have a quicker perception, less egotism, more sensibility, more disinterestedness, and what gives a charm by its sprightliness, they have more imagination; this may not be under so good control as that of the men, but it is always more chaste. They incline to speak as the heart prompts. Of course, their expression are not studied. This gives to their mann more grace and nature. Men are apt to wait for the slower working of the understanding; hence they are often deficient in ease. The very circumstances that imparts life and spirit to the conversation of some women, and which gives them, in this particular, a superiority over men, sometimes abates the pleasure of social intercourse with them. Their vivacity is not always well governed. Full of ideas which they are anxious to throw out, they do not stop to get an opinion of others, but often check an attempt to reply. They are a little apt to imagine they convince, when, in fact, they confound or silence by redundancy of words. This is a great fault, which shows the effect of bad training. When practised by men, it is a species of brow-beating; when by women, it is loquacity produced by bad habit. In the one it is culpable; in the other it is want of thought. The conversation of a sensible man is doubtless edifying; but that of a woman of cultivated mind, with knowledge of the world, is delightful. The impression is deeper, when conveying, as it often does, quite as much instruction under a more pleasing form. permitted to exert this influence in the manner most congenial to their nature and education; this is by sober precept, or by the more enlivening yet not less potent charm of social intercourse. Women have more penetration than men. Their peculiar sphere renders necessary the study of character, and this, with a tact that seems like intuition, enables them to obtain a knowledge of men and things which is of essential use in their course of life. Men are too indolent to undertake this labor, or feel themselves too independent to require it; whereas, women, brought up with less freedom, are driven to practice skill where strength is denied. If, then, they become more knowing in the characters of men, they are better able to adapt their manners and conversation to men's disposition or turn of mind; of course many render themselves instructive monitors, while they are more pleasing companions, not so much by their acquirements as by their natural qualities. From the Attleborough Bulletin. BY P. B. THOMAS. Apart from physical organization, which sympathises so intimately with the mental faculties, education, when promptly applied, THERE has never been a greater perversion comes in aid to give softness to the feminine of language than the using the pronoun you, character. The mind is strengthened by por- in the place of thou. We are told by gramtions of the studies adopted in schools; but it marians that the pronoun, you, was formerly is at all times easy to perceive how much more used in the plural number. Now, of course, females are attracted by works wherein the if it was used in the plural number, it was of more gentle passions are portrayed, and how itself plural, and if it was of itself plural then, much this course of reading has an influence it is of itself plural now. But now-a-days it on the character. Women being thus formed, is used by all classes among us, except Quaas well by art as by nature, are wisely adapt-kers, in either number; so that when a person ed to the society of men, and this fitness is rather strengthened by the contrast the two present. The rugged nature of men who are destined to toil, to brave all the vicissitudes of life, to be in the foreground of a constant struggle, is meant to be tempered by the example of patient endurance; while the seeming feebler powers of women when properly exercised, seldom or never fail to cherish hope and soften the most obdurate heart. Even without a mandate from the highest authority, it would be self-evident that men and women are made to live and associate with each other. Women, then, should be makes an address and uses the word "you," we This leads me to tell you (I use "you" here in its legitimate number) why the society of For the Schoolmaster. May 25, 1857. the Bridgham School in Providence, May 26, 1857. They are given here, not because they are so very new or so very true, but because the subject is one of great interest and demands much attention. The following words were spoken at the dedication of At this late hour, I rise with diffidence to say but a few brief words. I am glad to be Quakers use what is called "the plain lan- Remarks at Dedication of Bridgham School, guage." It has always been supposed by people generally, that Quakers use their peculiar language for the sake of being odd or for gratifying some whimsical notion; but William Penn tells us that they use it because it, and none but it, is grammatical. He tells us too, that it has been used in all languages and dialects, and through all ages. It was God's language when he first spoke to Adam. It was also, according to Penn, the language of the Assyrians, Chaldeans, Grecians, &c. And is now the language of Turks, Tartars, Persians, Swedes, Danes and many others. Quakers contend, and rightly too, that if ancients and moderns, except ourselves, used you in the plural number and not in the singular, that there is no reason for our using it when speaking to a single person. Using you for thou causes us to depart from some of the fundamental rules of grammar. For example: we are taught that "a verb should agree with its nominative number and person." Then when we say, first person "I am," second person "you are," &c., you see that the verb are, which is plural, agrees with a singular pronoun, which is contrary to the rule just repeated. Allowing thou to be singular, and you plural, there certainly would be as much propriety in saying thou to twenty persons as there would in saying you to one person; then it behooves you all to guard well against this too common, though long allowed error. But some may ask why this confounding of thou and you? History informs us that you was first ascribed to proud Popes and Emperors for the sake of flattery, thereby ascribing a plural honor to a single person; as if one Pope was made up of many Gods, and an Emperor of many men. Thou, did not seem to be enough for Popes and Emperors,-they wished to be addressed by some word that would indicate many. And, as this was applied to them, so in a short time it was applied to inferior officers, and finally to everybody. AN OLD LADY objected to giving her son a collegiate education after learning that "profane history," was one of the studies. here, to look upon the latest built, most ele gant and convenient of the school-houses of our State, and to see how the people who have profited by such structures in the past, and who are expecting hereafter to reap a double profit, from this and similar ones, in their children. I am glad too, that it is at a late hour; for I am heartily glad, first to have listened to what has been so profitably said by the eloquent and practical gentlemen, who have spoken before me. And in the moment through which my remarks ought to run, I wish to call attention to a matter, that in our abundant zeal for educating and instructing or imparting knowledge and discipline, there is, at least, some degree of forgetting; or if not of forgetting, surely of failing to act upon every day and every moment of our work. For it is the fate and the sin of poor human nature to fall in act and deeds far below its known and acknowledged obligatory ideal. This building in every part of it-its outside, its inside, its walls and roof, its rooms with their appointments of blackboards, maps, seats, books and apparatus, speaks in a language not to be misunderstood by any person, of mind to be aroused, informed, stimulated. It tells of thoughts to be awakened and expounded; of knowledge to be gained and applied; of science to be discovered and made servicable to mankind. It tells us that the people themselves of this goodly city are determined that all her children shall be educated. For if these same people take the whim into their heads, in a year, almost, they can shut up this school-house, and all others in the city. But they are determined that every child, which a good Providence gives them to bless the city and the State, shall at least have the opportunity to learn more than Bacon actually knew-if not much more than he dared to dream; or if that child do not learn being deprived of the means by his own stub- In all our school systems and their operaborness or by his parent's bigotry or avarice, tions, therefore, as teachers, as parents, as he shall be daily reminded of the inestimable educators, as philanthropists, let us not fail blessings provided at the expense of his fellows to seek to make CHARACTER rather than acfor his instruction in wisdom and knowledge. complishments. It was character in her citiIf he will not eat, or if his friends will hinder zens that made Sparta of old the warlike and him from eating the fruit of the tree of knowl-invincible State that she was; and character edge so skillfully cultivated within his reach, too, infused by her citizens into the hearts of he shall daily, by the sight of its goodly her children, by mothers as well as by fathers branches and fruits, be reminded of all that and teachers, by rulers and commanders. The he had inherited and might, as an American people every where talked of this ideal characitizen, have enjoyed and profited by. All ter, till the very atmosphere was so full of it, this speaks with an emphasis not to be misun- that the child and even the infant was fashionstood, and tells of the settled determinationed by its influence. So it was at old Rome. of the people themselves to educate all their And even now, the Spartan and the Roman children, the best heritage of the State. And character lives in the love and admiration of when a people has come deliberately and un-men far more than the glory of their arms or alterably to such a determination as this, then we may be sure they have taken a great step in the upward course of human progress and have acquired strength and momentum for still more rapid advancement. the grace of their literature. It was character far more than discipline or practice that in the wars of the French Revolution, gave to the Englsh soldiers so many important victories; and this it was that made Bonaparte and his generals affect to despise the dullness of the English who "did not know when they were fairly whipped," and this it was that made an English line of bayonets far more effective in rolling back the impetuous charge of Murat or Ney, than an Austrian redoubt in a mountain pass, or a Russian battery of a thousand cannon spouting forth a volcano of fire. But there is another idea much higher than this, another determination nobler than this and far more profitable to a people. The idea that CHARACTER is of infinitely more value than mere knowledge, and discipline and accomplishments; the determination that our children shall possess character, whatever else they may lack. Education, as commonly understood, or instruction, or the acquisi- It was character too-far more than knowltion of knowledge, is but comparatively little edge or discipline-that made our own Washmore than an accomplishment, or at most, ington the successful champion of modern only an instrument for use, and the skill to liberty, and the organizer of our constitutionwield that instrument. It is something putal freedom. And this, far more than genius, on, and although very valuable and even high- makes his memory so fresh and delightly necessary, yet compared to the formation ful in the hearts of the world. There was of character, which is nothing more nor less truth, honor, virtue, nobility, character in his than the metal and grain and texture of the soul, and this made him successful and imsoul itself it is hardly worthy of mention. A mortal, and not his prominent place, nor the people must seek this fruit, and make its chil- resources at his command, nor yet the expedren to be something true and noble in their rience and education he had had. It was souls, and then they will be worth educating. because of what he was, that he was able to When there is stamina in the soul of the child, do what he accomplished. And so it must this is worth educing, educating, according to be with our children. We must first look the old Latin root of the word, drawing out, to see what they are, and we can rely on them informing, furnishing, polishing. But when to do what they ought. And we must aim there is no nobility of soul, no intrinsic excel- to use our schools to form and establish the lence of character, while it may be well to in-characters of those who attend them, and if struct and to discipline, it is hardly worth by any chance those come into them who are the while to educate and to aim to make strong not by nature so noble as they may be, it must and perfect. be the study of the teachers and the school EVIL COMPANY.-Sophronius, a wise teacher of the people, did not allow his sons and daughters, even when they were grown up, to associate with persons whose lives were not moral and pure. "Father," said the gentle Eulalie, one day when he refused to permit her to go in company with her brother to visit the frivolous Lucinda-" Father, you must think that we are very weak and childish, since you are afraid that it would be dangerous to us in visiting Lucinda." committee and supervisors to bring them up the means of educating their children in their to the standard and make them daily grow in midst allow this to be lost sight of. Say to grace and nobility. Let learning, such as the teacher, "whatever else my boy or reading, writing, and ciphering by no means my girl learns at school, I want him to learn be neglected, but let it point to something to speak the truth, and to practice it. Whathigher, and let it work out something nobler ever graces he acquires, I want him to acquire and more valuable. Here we must demand the true character of noble humanity." that our schools shall realize the most be- And when we come to this kind of teachwitching dream of the alchemists, and. trans-ing, we may be sure that our schools will mute all characters into gold, or at least into more than fulfil the best dreams of their foundsilver. There is in every little child, whatever ers. They will bring in all the young and religious theory on this subject we may adopt; will form to models of christian nobility and there is in every little child or in connection | honor as much higher than Spartan and the with Divine Grace to be imparted, the capa- Roman, than the precepts of Jesus are higher bility to become almost infinitely good and than that of Lycurgus or Numa. wise; to be transmuted into some stone, precious for building or grace, or some metal, useful and ornamental, the great arts and sciences of life; and the school must by no means forget this. It must seek to transform and make over rather than to gild or to polish. I was in a jewelers shop a few days since, while a customer was buying some article which was recomended as " tripple plated on white metal." "And what is the advantage of having it plated on white metal?" asked the buyer. "Why," said the jeweler, "if the plating wears off, it will still show white and as good as ever, and if it breaks it appears to be the same material to the center." 'Now we want our schools at least to make our children to be white metal before they put on even the tripple plating of knowledge, so that, if in the service of life, the gilding should wear through, the character will still show white and clean. But more especially do we want them made of solid gold or silver, or even steel and iron, so that the more they wear down, the more white and pure shall the metal appear, and if,—which may God avert to them all-the trials and hard service of life shall now and then break one of them, there may still appear to the very center, the same stout, pure, useful metal, as intrinsically valuable after the accident as before, though perhaps not quite so available for present use. This is the great work of the school, this transmuting of souls; the work of a master of his business, and the work of an enlightened community. It must go on unseen and imperceptibly, but we must nevertheless make it go on daily. And never should a people with a school and Without saying a word, the father took a coal from the hearth and handed it to his daughter. "It will not burn you, my child," said he, "only take it." Eulalie took the coal, and beheld her tender white hand was black; and without thinking she touched her white dress, and it was blackened. "See," said Eulalia, somewhat displeased, as she looked at her hands and dress, "one cannot be careful enough when handling coals." "You see, "Yes, truly," said her father. my child, that the coal, even though it did not burn you, has nevertheless blackened you. So is the company of immoral persons." A WELL known political economist says: "We pay best, first, those who destroy us— generals; second, those who cheat us-politicians and quacks; third, those who amuse us-singers and musicians; and least of all, those who instruct us-authors, schoolmasters and editors. |