94 PSYCHOLOGY. 



health than are food and rest. It stimulates digestion, circulation, and 

 all the vital functions ; preventing disease, languor, and enervation. 

 It should be taken before, rather than after eating ; and should be 

 such as to call into action both the chest and the limbs. Rest should 

 also be taken regularly, both as regards retiring, and rising early. 

 Many other things belong to the formation and preservation of regu- 

 lar and proper habits, which we have no room here to mention. 



2. Under the head of Intellectual Education, we include the ac- 

 quisition of useful and ornamental, scientific and literary knowledge ; 

 such as may be attained in seminaries of learning. How far this acqui- 

 sition may be carried, in individual cases, will depend on many con- 

 ditions : but there are some branches of knowledge, so practically 

 useful, and so essential to good citizenship, that we think the study 

 of them should be required of every youth, by legislative enforce- 

 ment, and, where it is necessary, by pecuniary aid from the state. 

 Among these essential branches, we would mention Reading, Writing, 

 Arithmetic, Geography, and Grammar ; as the lowest permissible 

 degree of attainment. If these studies be tolerably acquired, they 

 will enable any individual, however humble be his station, with the 

 facilities which our age and country afford, to make farther advances 

 in knowledge ; each step of which will render still farther attainments 

 more easy. The studies next in importance, in the common walks 

 of life, are, we think, the first principles of Morals, Government, 

 History, Geometry, and Natural Philosophy, including Astronomy 

 and Chemistry ; the theory of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts ; 

 and especially the study of the Bible, its evidences, doctrines, and 

 precepts. Those who aspire to intellectual eminence, of course will 

 climb far higher than this, up the hill of science ; but the studies 

 here named should, we think, be taught in our Common Schools, and 

 should occupy the attention of young persons generally, during a part 

 of each year, until the age of maturity. 



The time, we trust, has gone by, when more general knowledge, 

 and higher studies, were deemed superfluous, to all except profes- 

 sional men, the lawyer, the physician, or the divine. It is now 

 admitted by many of the best judges, that a more liberal education, 

 either Academical or Collegiate, may be alike beneficial to the 

 Farmer, the Mechanic, and the Merchant ; as serving to expand and 

 quicken the mind, and to prepare the aspiring youth, not only for 

 engaging in the labors of his profession, but for adorning a higher 

 station, and becoming more extensively useful, should prosperity 

 attend his career. At least, the study of languages and calculative 

 processes, of mental and physical philosophy, of historical and 

 political truths, of the works of nature and of art, will lay a wide 

 basis for intellectual cultivation ; and it will be the student's own 

 fault if it is not improved, for his secular and eternal benefit. 



The value of the Greek and Latin languages, is, we apprehend, 

 often underrated. As sources of our own tongue, and of all the 

 modern languages of Southern Europe, they deserve the attention 

 of all thorough scholars ; aside from the rich treasures of history, 

 poetry, and philosophy which they embody. With regard to the 

 best order of the higher branches of study, we have high authority 



