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AN ESSAY ON THE EXPEDIENCY AND MEANS OF

ELEVATING THE PROFESSION OF THE EDU-
CATOR IN THE ESTIMATION OF THE PUBLIC.

"Wie kommts? Ist etwa der Bildung der Menschennatur an sich selbst eine geringere Kunst, als die Tanz-die Schauspiel-die Gesang-die Reitkunst, und die Kenntniss der Modenartikel? Ist etwa wirklich die Fertigkeit des Tänzers, die Bildung des Schauspielers, die Kunst eines Sängers, die Sattelfestigkeit des Reuters, und das Wissen eines Modehändlers mehr werth, als der Umfang der Erfordernisse der Menschenbildung im Ganzen? "So viel ist gewiss : der Mensch, das Meisterstück der Schöpfung, sollte auch das Meisterstück seiner selbst, das Meisterstück seiner kunst seyn.

"Aber ist er's, nachdem er Jahrtausende gelebt hat, ist er's. Kann er jeztauf seinen Lorbeeren ruhen, und es aussprechen: ich bin was ich seyn soll?"-Wocchenschript für Menschenbildung.*

PART I."THE EXPEDIENCY."

INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.

Intelligence is the sublimest characteristic of God, for it is that which actuates all the divine attributes, pervades the universe, and reflects through creation the visible similitude of the divine wisdom.

Intelligence is the high prerogative of man, created first with all his appetences eager for a pleasurable existence, his nature had yet to receive a nobler distinction in the approachable likeness to God, who shed over him the lustrous beatitude of his own image, and man became the reflective intelligence of his maker.

Intelligence therefore is the connective affinity between God and man, and though the original excellence of the soul be lost, and her brightness obscured, into the spiritual Eden kept and cultivated to

* How! Is, then, the education of human nature in itself less important than the knowledge of dancing, of the drama, of singing, of horsemanship, and the fashionable accomplishment of the day—is then, indeed, the expertness of the dancer, the science of the actor, the art of the singer, the skill of the horseman, or the wisdom of the fashionist, of more worth than the compass of the necessary education of human nature in the whole?

So much is certain: man, the masterpiece of creation, should also be the masterpiece of himself, and the masterpiece of his art.

But is it so ? After the experience of a thousand years, is he perfected? Can he now repose upon his laurels and exclaim, 'I am what I should be ?'

the highest possible perfection, the Deity may still descend and hold converse with his creature, and lead him through the observation and understanding of Nature, to the contemplation and worship of the divine holiness.* But this intelligence has another and nearer application, and herein, too, the similitude between the creature and the creator is obvious that as the attributes of the Deity are subject to intelligence, so the human virtues, which are the infinitely remote shadows of the divine, should be submissive to that "wisdom which cometh from above," that virtue should not arise from a brief and precarious impulse, but from an actuative principle in the soul—“ a new command give I unto you, that ye love one another." But how shall this law be fulfilled, when the image of God languishes fainter and fainter in the soul? for comparatively with his ignorance man degenerates, and in his debasement secedes farther and farther from the divine similitude. The translation of exalted intelligences into the "sanctities of heaven" is the declared object of mortal probation. Created with an inquisitive faculty, man begins in infancy the process of adaptation, taught by the Great Teacher himself through the instinctive and educative faculty of his being, ascending from the unerrable acquirements of first truths, to the comprehension of truths natural and revealed; until, refining more and more from the grossness of earth in his approachable resemblance to God, exhibiting in the two extremes of child-like simplicity and exalted intelligence, the perfection of humanity. "For the end of learning is to repair the ruin of our first parents, by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love Him, to imitate Him, to be like Him, as we may the nearest by possessing our souls of true virtue, which, being united to the heavenly grace of faith, makes up the highest perfection."+

Scarcely subsidiary to this divine purpose, but indeed correlative with it, is the relation and duty of man to man, how and in what manner he shall advance the well-being and happiness of all mankind, recognizing in each individual the fullest extension of the di

* Menschenbildung in ihrer Vollendung ist das Ideal wornach wir streben, von dem wir aber mit Paulus sagen: nicht dass ichs schon ergriffen habe und vollkommen sey; ich jage ihm aber nach, auf dass ergreifen möchte.-Wocchenschrift für Menschenbildung.-Education in its perfection is the ideal after which we strive, of which we might say, with Paul, "Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect, but I follow after, if that I might apprehend."

+ Milton.

vine law of "doing unto others that which he would they should do unto him." The application is hidden in the mystery of knowledge, not the mere knowledge of utilities, but that higher wisdom which associates mankind in one fellowship of love. Inclusive, therefore, intelligence involves all temporal good, which reconciles contraries, quickens every enjoyment, and multiplies the means.

That "knowledge is power" is familiarized as an axiom; and, however incomprehensive the capacity of that power, its efficacy is no longer problematical, for, by a principle essential to its existence, nations gain an ascendancy proportionate to their knowledge, which, further carried out, is also predicable of societies, of families, and of individuals. Every thing surrounding and influencing man witnesseth the beneficence of knowledge, as much so from the argument of his wants, as from the pleasures of fruition. But, notwithstanding the dignity and usefulness of knowledge, and though man by his nature is adapted to possess it, he exhibits a repugnance, for which ignorance is no plea, and in his insane opposition to its progress presents an inexplicable contrary in his self-love. He beholds the elements changed in their relations, ponderous bodies transformed into aerial, or condensed again into fluids, intractible metals fashioned into the thousand utilities of civilized life, "the great globe itself and all which it inhabits," touched by the Ithuriel spear of intelligence, submissive to his will and applicable to his wants. Yet must he be driven as a bondsman in the pursuit and acquisition of this (to him) creative power; at best to be draggled in the mire of a money-making sensuality, disfiguring the original image of God into the likeness of mammon, and turning the temple of the soul into a "house of merchandise."

But, reflecting upon the virtue of knowledge, both as it concerns the temporal and spiritual interest of man, what is the cause of the unnatural and parasitic evil attached to it, or whence comes so strange an anomaly in his conduct? Of evils, the most prominent are the tyranny of prejudice and the tyranny of teaching; the former tyranny will remedy itself if the latter and greater evil be removed, inasmuch as the tyranny of teaching not only seals up the innate inquisitiveness of the soul, but, by a mistake of the cause, knowledge is abhorred as the tyrant itself. By this tyranny over the tender spirits of children, good and evil are substituted for each other by an irresponsible choice, and which years of experience can hardly correct in the thinking and conduct of man.

But it is not the severity of coercion which is merely included in 14

VOL. X., NO. XXVIII.

the word tyranny, but the whole imperfect system of education pursued in too many schools in Great Britain. Can there be a harsher tyranny than the ill-directed teaching of an unskilful master ?* for whether learning be obnoxious from the tediousness of the process, or from the stripes of the rod, is of little consequence in the result. Without ascending to the heights of prophecy, but by an historical comparison of the social and intellectual character of all nations in all ages, it is neither a superstitious nor a sceptical opinion that, as long as the school discipline is characterized by its present empiricism and dull formality-as long as schoolmasters are the despised and needy huxters of a teaching trade-as long as the office is prostrated with all that is abject in circumstances and debased in opinion-so long will the nation present a godless, soulless, degraded character, in continuous retrogression from the presence and communion and image of God, into a lost and irrecoverable heathenism.

"Amidst all the shocks and revolutions of empires, a good system of public instruction would serve as a common insurance of this realm. And if it occupied the attention of governments as much as the incitements to avarice and the ambition of false glory, we might, to use a metaphor, admire the future prospect of Astrea descending from heaven, and reviving the reign of innocence and concord among men. Hitherto the earth can only be examined as a vast theatre of depopulation and waste; it is surely time to contemplate the dawnings of reason, happiness, and humanity, rising from among the ruins of a world which still reeks with the blood of its people, civilized as well as savage." But, however badly constituted the education system be, what is further to be deplored is, that even its slender benefits are partial and exclusive; as if difference of circumstances dispossessed man of his reason, expunged the divine image, and retroverted him into his irrational and animal being. The only knowledge the poor man is permitted to imbibe is to be sucked in through “the pipe

* The writer of this essay does not impugn the intellectual and moral character of schoolmasters indiscriminately, but rather questions their possessing what to him appears of much higher importance, inasmuch as it precedes knowledge itself the temperament or genius of teaching, and the philosophic understanding of the compound nature of man. The qualifications, indeed, of a teacher of youth, are so multiform and rare, as it were, the fruition of all knowledge and excellence, that, as Milton expresses, "I believe that this is not a bow for every man to shoot in that counts himself a teacher, but will require sinews almost equal to those which Homer gave Ulysses." + York.

of a sectary," which, partly from the early drenching process of its administration, and partly from its sameness and insipidity, leaves in maturer age scarcely any remembrance beyond the shadow of a creed.

On the other side, the maximum of education is seldom enough to exalt the soul above the mere doings of the day. Trained in what is aptly called a "commercial school," the pupils leave it scarcely more intelligent, and far more impure; or those who hang their satchels against the walls of a "classical academy," do they derive more useful knowledge or less moral defilement? or the inmates of the colleges and universities, do they learn to seek for wisdom as for hidden treasure? The same bad system of education prevails (more or less) from the universities to the village school, every day augmenting the overwhelming evil of a national, moral, and intellectual depravity.

Let it be remembered that it is knowledge which has raised man above the barbaric character of the savage, which has supplied him with every novelty and administered to every want. If, then, even so far as temporal good is concerned, the education of the few has done so much, what might not be looked for, with no vain prophetic eye, were all men educated!

Education is the interest of individuals, of societies, and of the world. Education is the strongest security of law, that moderates innovation, and by an universal self-respect establishes a voluntary submission to authority.

To redeem mankind from the superstitions and grossness of error Education must be elevated into a science, presiding over every other species of knowledge, thereby raising the first formative principle of the soul into an inclination for truth, man may regain to know God aright, and represent in his intelligence and goodness the image of his Maker. But the science of education, to be perfect as a whole, must be perfect in its parts, otherwise it will soon decline to its old corrupt and distempered state. The elevation of the duties must, therefore, involve the elevation of the office; and there can be no greater argument for "the expediency of elevating the profession of the educator" than the expediency of proving it.*

* Das Bedürfniss eines solchen Blattes spricht sich durch nichts so bestimmt aus als dadurch, dass diese Frage geschieht. Wenn ein Tanzmeister, ein Schauspieler, ein Sänger, ein Bereuter, ein Dilettant der Mode und des Luxus der in seiner Kunst einigen Ruf hätte, ein Blatt für die Bildung in derselben ankundigte, këin gebildeter Mensch unserer Zeit würde fragen: wozu das? Aber bei der Ankündigung eines Blattes fur Menschenbildung schwebt diese Frage auf den Lippen von so vielen.