Monthly Review qf Literature. ' 313 



from being matters of congratulation, are matters of regret. When we arc 

 told there are 60, or 600, or 6000 schools, we are told nothing, sometimes 

 worse than nothing. We do not ask for buildings, we ask for education. 



" But if the system be a good system, if every day furnishes in the in- 

 creased improvement of the moral and intellectual habits of the people 

 evidence positive and decisive of its goodness, then, indeed, the question of 

 extending such a blessing to all our population becomes an object of deep im- 

 portance ; and the adoption of every means which can accelerate its extension 

 is a duty. 



" But there is a third consideration, essential to the efficiency of the other 

 two : the education may be the best ; it may fully answer the high ends for 

 which it is designed ; it may have already produced a new race of men ; it 

 may have gone far to reform the morals and mind of the country. Again : 

 these changes may be general ; the spirit may have passed over every water, 

 the light penetrated into every dwelling. Instruction may be found on every 

 hill, under every green tree ! What secures the permanency of this blessing? 

 where are its roots laid ? on what does it live ? Enthusiasm is a wayward 

 nurse, and may desert its offspring at the very hour when its sustaining arm 

 may be the most necessary. The contributions of charity are fluctuating 

 often fleeting ; national grants are the instruments of parties ; modern 

 largesses often voted for the object of the hour, sometimes proposed with 

 little consideration, at others rejected with less. Are these to be the only 

 assurances which a nation should have for the duration of its education ; a 

 blessing which ought to be bound up with the very existence of the nation 

 itself? It is not sufficient that it be good, nor that it be extended; we must 

 have pledges that it will last: in other words, there must be means, not for 

 its establishment only, but for its continued support. To resume, national 

 education should, in the first place, be good; in the second, universal; and in 

 the third, should be provided with means for its permanent support" 



It would be presumptuous within the short limits of a magazine notice to 

 offer any analysis of the different chapters. Let it suffice for us to express an 

 opinion not advanced without deliberation, that this great topic, which is now 

 generally canvassed, has met with no advocate who unites to a very laudable 

 zeal and earnestness in the cause a greater degree of knowledge and discretion 

 than the honourable member for Waterford. 



The Philosophy of Education. By J. SIMPSON, Advocate. 12mo. 

 Black, Edinburgh. Second Edition. 



THE most striking feature in the improvement of the educationists of this 

 country is that their works are not as they used to be, abstruse and theo- 

 retical, involving the mysteries of metaphysics, but are become plain, practical, 

 and sensible. The principles are correctly laid down and traced to their 

 highest sources ; but they are always seen in connexion with the practical, 

 application. Mr. Simpson is well known in Scotland and in the north of 

 England as a zealous and discreet advocate of national education, and he has 

 for some years been an active patron of the great work of philanthropy which 

 is doing in the north. We congratulate him on the solid marks of approval 

 that his labours have met in different ways ; and while we earnestly recom- 

 mend to the perusal and study of our readers his small but concisely-written 

 volume, we wish its author the enjoyment of a life which he has hitherto 

 devoted, and we doubt not will still devote, to the furtherance of POPULAR 



EDUCATION. 



GEOGRAPHY AND NATURAL SCIENCE. 



A Guide for Invalids to the Continental Watering Places. Smith, 

 Elder, and Co., Cornhill. 



THIS very excellent little book furnishes the sickly or unstable with an ex- 



