322 Report on a Course of Liberal Education. 



applause. If he fail to enlighten his countrymen by his in- 

 tellectual superiority, he may at least attract their gaze by 

 the tinsel of his literary ornaments. This is the allurement 

 to a hurried and superficial education. We have abundant 

 supplies of this Lombardy-poplar growth ; slender, frail, and 

 blighted. We should like to see more of the stately elm 5 

 striking deep its roots, lifting its head slowly to the skies, 

 spreading wide its grateful shade, and growing more and 

 more venerable with years. There are few instances of a 

 more improvident expenditure of time and money, than that 

 which is wasted upon a superficial education. The parent 

 often labors hard to furnish his son with the means of ac- 

 quiring that which is of no substantial value ; when with a 

 little more time, and a small additional expense, a foundation 

 miffht have been effectually laid, for high literary excellence, 

 and professional distinction. 



Our duty to our country demands of us an effort to pro- 

 vide the means of a thorough education. There is perhaps 

 no nation whose interests would be more deeply affected, by 

 a substitution of superficial for solid learning. The univer- 

 sal diflTusion of the common branches of knowledge, renders 

 it necessary that those who aspire to literary eminence should 

 ascend to very elevated ground. They must take their po- 

 sition on a summit which towers above the height of sur- 

 rounding ranges of hills. In the midst of so enlightened a 

 population, can he be distinguished, whose education has 

 scarcely given him more enlarged views, than he might ac- 

 quire, by conversation in stages and steam boats; or the 

 reading of newspapers, and a volume or two of elegant ex- 

 tracts? 



The unexampled multiplication of schools and academies 

 in this country, requires that colleges should aim at a high 

 standard of literary excellence. The conviction is almost 

 universal, that the former, as well as the latter, admit of 

 great improvements. But who are to make these improve- 

 ments, and give character and tone to our systems of instruc- 

 tion, if there are few men of thorough education in the coun- 

 try 1 He who is to arrange an extensive scheme of meas- 

 ures, ought himself to stand on an eminence, from which he 

 can command a view of the whole field of operation. Su- 

 perficial learning in our higher seminaries, will inevitably ex- 

 tend its influence to the inferior schools. If the fountains 

 are shallow and turbid, the streams cannot be abundant and 



