714 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Affairs of Education," from which a feAV slips may be culled. The 

 author holds that it is very unwise to be "lenient, indulgent, uncon- 

 cerned, or superficial, in school-keeping," and considers it extremely 

 wrong to resort to " a false show of unmasticated, unprepared, unfit, 

 and undigested accumulation of stuff and. material, producing neither 

 educational bone, or muscle, or nerve, and. crammed in, drummed in, 

 or infused, as with a funnel, in a hurry, or in the worry and flurry of 

 an unquiet, unconcerted school." 



Who, understanding this, can doubt it ? Or who can doubt that 

 the confidence of the pupils in the teacher " renders them more apt 

 to conceive how much they are bound in gratitude to parents and 

 teacher, and to get aware of the depth of the contrast and abyss of 

 their real course and nature of action and that what it should be, and 

 thus makes them more studious to be grateful and to advance their 

 own interests as scholars ? " 



The teacher of this school, like most other Germans, believes in 

 systematic thoroughness. " But," says he, " this does not mean that 

 in the system that promotes perception, thorough thinking and rea- 

 soning, understanding, memory, self-reliance, deceitless ennobling en- 

 lightenment, and well-digesting progress, a scholar gets along slowly 

 over the ground or through the books ; on the contrary, while it ex- 

 cludes headway on the skip and jump, as each point is completely 

 learned and mastered, it makes the next depending on this so much 

 easier and more quickly grasped, and in a short time, what puzzles 

 and discourages others, becomes to him the greatest delight ; and thus 

 he progresses from point to point, from page to page, from combining 

 to combining the known with the unknown, the former unlocking and 

 explaining the latter, and so he moves faster and faster, leaving the 

 half-tutored, unsteady fustians far back in the distance." 



The last citation which I shall make from this document might be 

 construed into a rap at myself: 



" It would be malicious folly without self-respect, to detach parts of this cir- 

 cular from their dependent connection with others that explain their spirit and 

 application, and then to pervert their true construction ; hence it is not intended 

 for such persons," etc. 



On second thoughts, however, this passage can refer only to those 

 who have criticised the school and made light of its methods. " Let 

 the galled jade wunce, our withers are un wrung." We can only 

 express our admiration for such an extraordinary " Avell of English 

 undefiled," and for the profundity of the ideas contained in it. 



Another school of peculiar interest is the Mars Hill Academy, near 

 Florence, Alabama. The "permanent circular" of this institution, 

 now before me, bears date 1872, and contains many points worthy of 

 quotation. The merits of the school are well emphasized by the fol- 

 lowing paragraph : 



