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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



on the same principles as the provincial 

 board. The latter govern the higher schools 

 of first grade, and the former those of the 

 second grade, and the primary schools. 

 Al l of these boards are under the control 

 of an educational minister located at Ber- 

 lin, with whom they are in continual com- 

 munication, and to whom they make a gen- 

 eral report on school afiairs once in every 

 two or three years. There are also seven 

 examination commissions whose business it 

 is to examine applicants for the positions 

 of teachers. The Minister of Education ap- 

 points the professors of a university, from 

 names suggested to him by the academical 

 senate. The full professors elect a rector, 

 or, in cases where the king is titular rector, 

 a pro-rector, to serve for one year, and an 

 academical senate, also for one year. The 

 senate consists of the actual rector, the re- 

 tiring rector, and a full professor of each 

 faculty. Besides the full professors, is a 

 class of assistant professors, and another 

 class called privatdocent, which stands partly 

 in the capacity of private tutor and partly 

 as an attache of the university. 



KRtJsi's Drawing. By Hermann Krusi, 

 A. M. New York : D. Appleton & Co. 



The art of Drawing and the art of think- 

 ing are based alike upon two simple princi- 

 ples. The crude leaf-picture of the novice 

 and the accurate landscape of the expe- 

 rienced draughtsman are the results of 

 one and the same process — the combina- 

 tion of straight and curved lines. The only 

 difference between them lies in the degree 

 of skill with which the lines are combined. 

 The infant, recognizing its mother, displays 

 the same mental process that Newton em- 

 ployed to produce his "Principia." The 

 child recognizes its mother by perceiving her 

 unlikeness to the other persons around her. 

 Newton discovered the law of gravitation 

 by detecting the likeness displayed in the 

 movements of falling bodies. The art of 

 thinking, in its rudest as well as its most 

 perfect state, is simply the detection of like- 

 nesses and unlikenesses displayed in things. 

 The only rational method, therefore, of cul- 

 tivating the art of thinking — in other words, 

 of education — is to teach the mind to seek 

 for and trace out those likenesses and un- 

 likenesses. To cultivate the art of Draw- 



ing, the pupil is taught to distinguish be- 

 tween straight and curved lines, between 

 the eflfect produced by drawing a straight 

 line in one direction, and that produced by 

 drawing it in another ; and further, to dis- 

 tinguish between the effects of combining 

 both kinds of lines in various ways. To 

 draw a leaf, a flower, or a house, he must 

 first recognize the differences in the various 

 major parts and minor parts, and then the 

 difiference in the character and direction of 

 the lines required to represent those parts. 

 But that is learning to discriminate between 

 different things and different parts of the 

 same thing, is learning to recognize like- 

 nesses and unlikenesses — is learning to 

 think. The child who maps off in his mind 

 the various like and unlike parts of a leaf 

 or a flower with a view to reproducing 

 them on the paper before him, is learning 

 to think in botany, and soon begins to 

 classify leaves, flowers, plants, and trees, 

 according to their peculiarities of form and 

 structure. He that observes the differ- 

 ences and similarities in the various parts 

 of an insect or an animal, for the purpose 

 of making a drawing of that insect or ani- 

 mal, is learning his first lessons in zoology. 

 And he that is able to represent the differ- 

 ent forms and structures of rocks and min- 

 erals has learned his first lessons in geology 

 and mineralogy. In short, there is scarcely 

 a science that cannot be taught, well taught, 

 and agreeably taught, by the aid of Draw- 

 ing. For, in teaching a pupil to draw, you 

 cultivate his observation, quicken his per- 

 ception, and strengthen his judgment. He 

 forms a habit of scrutinizing objects with a 

 view to discerning their component parts, 

 which is an act of observation ; of sepa- 

 rating the like and unhke parts from each 

 other, and these again into their respective 

 smaller parts, which is an act of perception ; 

 and, in comparing the features of the parts 

 with each other for the purpose of ascer- 

 taining their likeness or unlikeness, he per- 

 forms an act of judgment. Thus drawing 

 awakens and develops the three most im- 

 portant faculties of the mind ; upon them 

 rests the whole fabric of Thought. By ob- 

 servation of things, we perceive their differ- 

 ences from some things and likeness to 

 others, and we judge or classify them ac- 

 cordingly ; and from observation of things 



