EDITOR'S TABLE. 



625 



Smith's remark that the universities 

 are in the habit of taking credit for all 

 the mind they do not succeed in ex- 

 tinguishing, it is pretty certain that 

 the small number of graduates who 

 give character to the school are those 

 who would succeed under any system. 

 So far, indeed, as the great body of the 

 students are concerned, there is small 

 ground for boasting of the success of 

 the English system. When we con- 

 sider the wealth and resources of the 

 English universities and great public 

 schools, when we remember their 

 ancient prestige, the talent at their 

 command, and their high place in pub- 

 lic confidence, in the light of the re- 

 sults produced, we can cordially agree 

 with Prof. Blackie, of Edinburgh, in 

 his letter to Dr. Hodgson, when he 

 pronounces the whole system "a su- 

 perstition, a blunder, and a failure." 



School-discipline can never be di- 

 vorced from the nature of school-occu- 

 pation. If the studies are repulsive, 

 if they do not take hold of the feelings, 

 or if they produce indifference or an- 

 tagonism, force is the teacher's only al- 

 ternative, to keep the school in order, 

 and carry on its work. The essential 

 implication of coercion in influencing 

 conduct is a penal policy. A compul- 

 sory system is one that punishes for a 

 breach of rules. In civil society, where 

 the object is simple protection, govern- 

 ment has nothing to do but to attach 

 penalties to the violation of law. But 

 it is widely different in education, the 

 object of which is to incite the student 

 to put forth his energies ; for, in the 

 end, all true education is self-education. 

 But a punitive system appeals to the 

 lowest motive, the fear of the infliction 

 of some form of pain, and it can never 

 stimulate to the best or highest action. 

 In the past history of education, flog- 

 ging has been its almost constant ac- 

 companiment, and this has been coin- 

 cident with schemes of study that have 

 failed to enlist the sympathies of pupils, 

 and to quicken their nobler emotions. 

 vol. 11. 40 



Take the one element of language, the 

 study of which constitutes the staple of 

 school-drudgery, and which is habitual- 

 ly pursued as arbitrary and irrational 

 task- work, and what can we expect but 

 that students will require to be driven 

 through the irksome routine of daily 

 toil. Prof. Halfourd Vaughn indulged 

 in no exaggeration, when, called before 

 a committee of the British Parliament 

 to testify as to the working of the Eng- 

 lish system, he said : " There is no study 

 that could prove more successful, in 

 producing, often thorough idleness and 

 vacancy of mind, parrot-like repetition 

 and sing-song knowledge, to the abey- 

 ance and destruction of the intellectual 

 powers, as well as to the loss and paral- 

 ysis of the outward senses, than our 

 traditional study and idolatry of lan- 

 guage." Two hundred years ago, Milton 

 criticised the education of his time from 

 exactly this point of view. He de- 

 nounced it unsparingly, and went so far 

 as to declare that a better system was 

 not only possible, but might do more 

 even for dunces than the prevailing 

 method could do for brighter minds, 

 and he put the statement in the follow- 

 ing quaint and pungent form : " I doubt 

 not that ye shall have more ado to 

 drive our dullest and laziest youth, our 

 stocks and stubs, from the infinite de- 

 sire of such a happy nurture, than we 

 have now to haul and drag our hope- 

 fullest and choicest wits to that asinine 

 feast of sow-thistles and brambles, 

 which is commonly set before them as 

 the food of their tenderest and most 

 docible age." 



THE FAREWELL BANQUET TO PRO- 

 FESSOR TYXDALL. 



Peof. Ttndall having closed his la- 

 bors in this country, has sailed for home. 

 His work has made a deep impression 

 upon the public mind, as was testified 

 by the farewell dinner given in big 

 honor in this city, before leaving. 

 The affair was, in several respects, re- 



