184; ItEVTEWS — THE COURSE OE COLLEGIATE EDUCATION. 



factures, our steamboats, and our railroads. We level the forest in a day, lay 

 down our tracks and startle the old world with the sound of our engines. Our 

 steamers outspeed theirs across the ocean. Our yachts win the royal prize over 

 the ancient ship builders in the sight of the Majesty of England. The Autocrat 

 of Russia employs our engineers to make his railroads ; aud his steamers are 

 built on our shores. 



" Shall we be behind then only in the great matter of Education ? Can we not 

 build up Universities too? Shall we apply to the cultivation of Mind a prin- 

 ciple of slow progression which we scorn to apply to anything else ? Let it not 

 be my countrymen — let it not be. Arouse, thy energies young State of Michi- 

 gan! Giant of the West 1 holding the great lakes in the hollow of thine hands ; 

 bearing on thy bosom, deep engraven, the memorial of thy glorious deeds ; look- 

 ing with eyes of light upon all thy brothers around thee, and inspiring them 

 with thy majesty and beauty ; speak out with thy strong aud melodious voice the 

 decree that here a new Athens shall arise with its schools of Philosophy and 

 Art, and its Acropolis crowned with another Parthenon, more glorious that that 

 of old, because illumined with the true light from heaven !" 



The Parthenon of our Canadian Acropolis will not, we are satisfied, 

 manifest any of this new-world speed. The work is all before us, 

 and must be done, slowly, patiently, above all, thoroughly. It is 

 easy for a time, to throw dust in the people's eyes with the help of 

 grand names, magnificent talk of Prussian systems, — meant only to 

 end in talk, — granddoquent novelties of graduation titles ; and the 

 substitution of an ad captandum scientific nomenclature to such good 

 old-fashioned school-boy acquisitions as writing and arithmetic : 

 " Sciences of Accounts and Commercial Computations!" the "semi- 

 angular system of Penmanship, both practical and ornamental!" 

 &c, and — which is quite of a piece with this, — lists of Members of 

 faculties eked out by the help of honorary lecturers and Emeritus 

 Professors ! Noah Webster bluntly explains to his countrymen that 

 an Emeritus is one honorably discharged from service. We wonder 

 what the Professor of Commercial Ethics would say to the retention 

 of such on the list of Teachers ! We would willingly hope that 

 Canadians are not to be caught by such chaff. Nevertheless, the 

 truth must not be disguised that Canada has yet to learn the just ap- 

 preciation of a well organised system of education, extending beyond 

 the ordinary requirements of common schooling. The very desire for 

 learning, apart from its mere marketable value as the stepping stone 

 to a profession, has to be created. And on this subject, the following 

 just remarks of Professor Blackie, are not without their application 

 to ourselves : 



" To get rid of the uneasv sensation, and the shock to our self-esteem, caus ed 

 by the honest presentation of these facts, I can easily imagine that some stout 

 champion of things as they are, will come blurt out with tho old question — 

 Well, if we are not a learned nation, what harm ? If the Germans write anown- 



