SCHOOLS. 



129 



and the greatest and best part of this plan remains, 

 as yet, unexecuted.* Somewhat earlier, there 

 existed, in the German provinces of Russia, good 

 gymnasia, and some common and country schools; 

 but the latter are still in a very low condition. 

 The education of Catholic youth was attended to 

 by the Jesuits, who were admitted by Catharine II. 

 into White Russia. 



Poland, where, formerly, the nobility only were 

 instructed by the members of religious orders (La- 

 zarists, Piarists and Jesuits), had, before its parti- 

 tion, some gymnasia, founded towards the end of 

 the eighteenth century, and some common and 

 country schools, but no well arranged school sys- 

 tem. During the existence of the grand-duchy of 

 Poland, something was intended to be done for the 

 education of children of both sexes; but it was 

 not executed, and the last catastrophe, which has 

 reduced Poland to a Russian province, must have 

 a most injurious effect on the few means of educa- 

 tion which the country affords. 



Denmark, Holland (which has far outstripped 

 Catholic Belgium), and Switzerland, strive to keep 

 pace with Protestant Germany; but the improve- 

 ment of Switzerland has not been so great as might 

 have been expected, after the impulse given by 

 Pestalozzi. Some cantons, however, have semina- 

 ries for the education of teachers ; and Denmark 

 has had them for forty years. The Danish govern- 

 ment issued, in 1814, a school ordinance for its 

 German provinces, which contains many wise di- 

 rections. Holland distinguished itself early by insti- 

 tutions for philological instruction, and the society 

 for the public welfare (founded in 1784) has given 

 a good organization to the common schools. 



In no part of the continent, however, has so much 

 been done for schools, and education been made so 

 much a particular branch of study by thinking men, 

 as in Germany. Bavaria was the first of the larger 

 states in which this subject received the particular 

 attention of the government. Since 1806, the 

 schools in that kingdom have been conducted 

 systematically on a general plan. There is a parti- 

 cular department, in the ministry of the interior, to 

 superintend the subject of education, whose autho- 

 rity extends to all the various schools and institu- 

 tions. The smaller states have done much for 

 schools, as Nassau, Lippe-Detmold^Anhalt-Dessau, 

 and the Saxon dukedoms. Though Hanover and 

 Brunswick established seminaries for the formation 

 of instructors in the last century, their subsequent | 

 progress has been comparatively slow. Saxony, 

 which took the lead in this particular after the re- 

 formation, always had its schools for instruction in 

 philology, and also good common schools; yet it 

 did not advance, as might have been hoped See 

 Ruhkopf's History of Schools and Education in Ger- 

 many (in German). 



Out of Europe, the United States of America 

 only have an effective system of education. In the 

 United States, the provisions for education are 

 made chiefly by the state authorities, and are very 

 different in different parts of the country; but no 

 where has popular education in general received 

 more attention, or been carried to greater extent. 

 Of the colleges of that country we have given some 

 account in the article College. Next in rank to 

 these seminaries are the establishments called aca- 

 demies, founded by private bequests, or public 



* See the Statistiyif et Hi. tniire tie li Rittsie, pnr J. P. 

 Schnitxler (Pariu, 1829). 



grants, in which Latin and Greek, and commonly 

 one or more modern languages, with geography, 

 history, the elementary portions of mathematics, 

 and physical philosophy are generally taught. In 

 the grammar schools, the course of study is very 

 different; sometimes only reading, writing, grammar 

 and arithmetic are taught, but geography is fre- 

 quently studied in them, and sometimes history. 

 Below these, in some places, there are primary 

 schools, kept by women for younger children, and 

 numerous infant schools, which take the child al- 

 most from the cradle. In this way, a child may, in 

 some instances, be educated, from the age of three 

 or four, to that of sixteen or seventeen, without 

 any fee for tuition. The federal government has, 

 in the disposition of the public lands, made provi- 

 sions for common schools, by reserving one section 

 of each township, for the support of schools in the 

 township, besides making other reservations for 

 colleges. (See Public Lands.) The system of free 

 schools has been carried to the greatest perfection 

 in the New England states, in which, though the 

 details of the system differ much, yet the leading 

 principles are the same. More is generally done 

 than is required by law, by the towns in their cor- 

 porate capacity, besides the great numbers of pri- 

 vate schools, all over the country, for all ages and 

 of all descriptions. Thus, in the city of Boston, in 

 which the legal expenditure on the free schools 

 would amount to but 3000 dollars per annum, the 

 yearly expense is actually upwards of G0,000 dol- 

 lars, supporting eighty schools, with 7430 pupils ; 

 besides which there are 155 private schools in the 

 city, with 4018 pupils, making a total of 235 

 schools, and 11,448 pupils, in a population of less 

 than 62,000 souls. In Massachusetts, the laws re- 

 quire that every town or district, containing fifty 

 families, shall be provided with a school or schools, 

 equivalent in time to six months for one school in 

 a year ; if containing 100 families, twelve months; 

 150 families, eighteen months ; and the towns are 

 required to raise the sums of money necessary for 

 the support of the schools in the same manner as 

 other town taxes. The state of Connecticut has a 

 fund, derived from the sale of lands in Ohio, of 

 1,882,261 dollars, the income of which (upwards of 

 72,000 dollars) is appropriated to the support of 

 common free schools. The number of children be- 

 tween four and sixteen, in 1828, was 84,899. The 

 great principle on which the system is founded, is, 

 that elementary education should be so free as to 

 exclude none, and the schools so numerous as to be 

 within the reach of all, at the same time that their 

 management should be principally intrusted to the 

 people themselves, in small districts, so as to excite 

 and sustain a general interest among all classes. 

 The tax is on property, and thus the poorer classes 

 are saved from a burden which might otherwise be 

 too great for them, at the same time that they pay 

 enough to render them desirous of securing the 

 benefit of the schools ; and the rich are glad to se- 

 cure the most effectual protection for order and 

 property, in the general intelligence and morality of 

 the people. (See the valuable paper of professor 

 Ticknor, in the English Quarterly Journal of 

 Education, No. IV.) For the population of New 

 England, consisting of less than 2,000,000, there 

 are between 10,000 and 12,000 schools, 150 aca- 

 demies, and eleven colleges, besides great numbers 

 of private schools and boarding schools. We have 

 given an account of the state of schools in New 

 York, in the article New York, division Public In- 



