MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER: AN AGRICULTURAL. LITERARY AND FAMILY NEWSPAPER, 
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For Moore'e Rural Now-Torker 
STUDY OF THE ANCIENT LANGUAGES, 
The nineteenth century stands unparalleled 
in the history of the world. It i3 emphati¬ 
cally an age of steam and lightning. With¬ 
out these, thousands of years could not have 
accomplished the work of the last fifty years. 
Every day aids to the store of things to be 
known, api increases the necessity of know¬ 
ing them- And a3 the field of labor is con¬ 
tinually enlarged, time is rendered more val¬ 
uable to-day than it was yesterday. It is 
then necessary that, in this busy age, which 
is every day expanding the circle of know¬ 
ledge, the time given to the educational career 
be strictly economised and regulated. We 
must not give to any branch of education 
more importance than it intrinsically de¬ 
serves, and, looking always to real utility as 
our guide, we should know of what practical 
benefit such studies as have engaged a consid¬ 
erable attention of the student, will prove to 
him in after life. 
With these prefatory remarks, I proceed at 
once to the subject of this essay —the ancient 
classics. The first thing that strikes us in 
this department of study, is that its impor¬ 
tance has been, and with some modification, 
still is, greatly exaggerated. The ancient 
classics occupy, as it were, the foreground in 
our colleges, and engage the time and atten 
tion of the student more than any other 
branch of studies. To those, indeed, who are 
destined for one of the professions, or who in¬ 
tend to study literature on an enlarged plan, 
or to devote themselves to this branch as a 
profession, the Greek and Latin literature are 
of especial benefit. And were there no pro¬ 
vision made for a supply of classical scholars, 
any system of education would be defective ; 
for classical scholars are as necessary in the 
mental, as lawyers and doctors in the physical 
world; and we feel grateful to those who 
have encouraged and upheld classical learning. 
But to the generality of students—the young 
men who wish to educate themselves for the 
offices of civil life, whoi would come into the 
world qualified for the practical career of life, 
—to those, I hold, the ancient classics are not 
strictly requisite. When time is so valuable, 
they should not devote one-third of their edu¬ 
cational course to a study which in a few 
years they must necessarily forget, while they 
neglect others, the knowledge of which they 
cas make useful to themselves and to their 
fellow men. 
Bat, I shall be met with the inquiry, why 
is the cry raised against the Greek and Latin 
classics ? Are these alone forgotten in the 
turmoil of life ? Are not, in many, nay in 
more cases, the mathematical studies as little 
remembered ? And might we not say the 
same of all the other studies, when we take 
into consideration the respective classes of 
men who have pursued such studies ? Shall 
we, then, direct our attention to those studies 
only which may have an immediate connec¬ 
tion with our future pursuits in life ? Rather 
should we not seize upon all the knowledge 
within our reach, and discipline our mental 
faculties, whatever be our future course of life? 
Every candid mind must admit the justness 
of these questions, and as I intend in this 
essay to state candidly my own convictions, I 
cannot deny their just propriety. How, 
then, can I, admitting the principles of these 
questions to be true, consistently advocate 
this seeming paradox ? How dare I set up 
an opinion against that of the learned majori¬ 
ty ? But my object is not to advocate the 
neglect of all such studies as are of no practi¬ 
cal utility in after life, but the substitution of 
such studies as will tend not only to discipline 
our mind, but also to be available to us in 
future life,—studies that will be of intellectual 
as well as practical benefit. 
It is admitted by all that no student spend¬ 
ing four years within college walls can obtain 
a perfect knowledge of any one department 
of study, while in some branches he receives 
little or no instruction. It is therefore neces¬ 
sary to select the most important branches of 
education. But the time allotted to the 
course of study in our Institutions, is not 
sufficient for the attainment of the most impor¬ 
tant branches, even. Students should therefore 
direct their special attention to those which, 
while they improve their mental faculties, will 
also be available to them in every step of life, 
and sufficient for a foundation upon which to 
build further acquisitions. Upon this ground 
I maintain that those, whom I consider as the 
generality of students, should not devote 
themselves to the Greek and Roman classics, 
since these do not adequately compensate 
them for the time and labor bestowed in their 
attainment. 
Now, it will be asked if no adequate bene¬ 
fits result from the study of the classics, how 
happens it that they have been read and 
studied ever since they were produced ? 
But the circumstance that they have been 
long held in honor, and been of immense 
benefit to the earlier ages, is no sufficient 
reason why all students should indiscrimi¬ 
nately study them now. For before the age 
of Shakespeare and Bacon, a man who 
could not read Greek and Latin, could read 
nothing, or next to nothing, in any other 
language. None could receive any other than 
a classical education. For the English, 
French and German were as yet only in an 
incipient stage of self-development, and in a 
state of continual fluctuation. In fact, with¬ 
out a knowledge of the Latin language, no 
person could then ascertain clearly the state 
of the political or the religious world. 
[Concluded next week.l 
GOOD SCHOOL HOUSES. 
The close connection of good houses with 
good schools, is now conceded by every intel¬ 
ligent friend of popular education. 
Indeed, it is hardly possible to have a good 
school without a good school house ; and the 
ultimate success of our whole system of Com¬ 
mon Schools depends as much on a thorough 
reform in the construction, furniture, and care 
of school houses, as upon any other single 
circumstance whatever. 
The people should bear in mind, and be en¬ 
couraged by the fact, that when each district 
shall be provided with a suitable school house, 
the expense will not recur for a generation. 
Parents should also remember, that the in¬ 
terest which their children take in their 
studies, and the progress which they make in 
the acquisition of learning, most materially 
depend upon the condition, location, and gen¬ 
eral arrangement of the school house which 
they occupy. If it is located without refer¬ 
ence to the taste, health, or comfort of the 
teacher or pupil; if it stands on the public 
highway, on the border of a swampy moor, 
on the top of a barren knoll, in the middle of 
a bleak plain, or in any other exposed, un¬ 
pleasant, uncomfortable spot; if it is desti¬ 
tute of play-ground, enclosure, shrub, or shade 
tree, and everything else calculated to render 
it pleasing and attractive; if its ceiling is 
only eight or ten feet high, instead of twelve 
or fourteen ; if it3 dimensions are so contract¬ 
ed as to afford,, on an average, only forty or 
fifty feet of cubic air to each pupil, instead of 
one hundred and fifty or two hundred ; if no 
provision is made for a constant supply of 
that indispensable element of health and life, 
pure air, except the rents and crevices which 
time and wanton mischief have made ; if it is 
so utterly destitute of internal conveniences 
and external attractions, as to resemble a 
gloomy prison or an Indian wigwam ; if it 
stands in disgraceful contrast with all the 
other edifices in the neighborhood, public or 
private; if the only plan or principle which 
determined its size and furniture, was the 
minimum scale of expenditure; if the pupils, 
while attending school in it, should suffer 
from heat or cold, from too much or too little 
light; if the quantity of air contained in it, i 3 
so small as to be soon exhausted of its oxy¬ 
gen, and to cause the pupils to suffer from 
dullness, depression, and head ache ; if, in 
short, it is so badly constructed, so imperfect¬ 
ly ventilated, so replete with vulgar ideas, and 
so utterly repugnant to all habits of neatness, 
thougnt, taste, or purity, a3 to cause the pupil 
to regard it as the most comfortless and 
wretched tenement which he ever entered, to 
think of it with utter repugnance, to dread 
instinctively the tasks which it imposes, and, 
finally, to take his leave of it as a prison, 
from which he is but too happy to escape ; if 
such is the condition of their schooi house, 
then, surely, parents ought to remember that 
if their children attend school in such an in¬ 
convenient, repulsive, disparaging, unhealthy 
tenement, their lives will be endangered, their 
physical powers injured, their intellects im¬ 
paired, their love of learning deadened, their 
moral sensibilities blunted, their manners be¬ 
come vulgar, and every impression connected 
with the school, deepened into the most irre¬ 
pressible antipathy. — Michigan Journal of 
Education. 
The Will and the Way. — I learned 
grammar when I was a soldier on the pay of 
sixpence a day. The edge of my berth, or 
that of my guard-bed, was my seat to study 
on ; my knapsack my book case, and a bit of 
board, lying on my lap, was my writing-table. 
I had no money to purchase a candle or oil; 
in winter, it was rarely that I could get any 
light but that of the fire, and only my turn 
even of that. To buy a pen or piece of pa- 
paper, I wa? compelled to forego some por¬ 
tion of my food, though in a state of half- 
s’arvation. I had not a moment of time that 
I could call my own ; and I had to read and 
write amid the talking, laughing, singing, 
whistling and bawling of at least half a score 
of the most thoughtless men — and that, too, 
in their hours of freedom from all control. 
And I say, if I, under these circumstances, 
could encounter and overcome the task—is 
there, can there be, in the whole world, a 
youth who can find an excuse for the non-; 
performance ?— Cobbett. 
Rules for Study. —The other evening 
Professor Davies, the eminent mathematician, 
in conversation with a young friend of his 
upon the importance of system in studying, 
as well as in everything else, took a piece of 
paper, and wrote off for him the following 
important rules :—1. Learn one thing at a 
time. 2. Learn that thing well. 3. Learn 
its connections, as far as possible, with al 
other things. 4. Believe that to know every 
thing of something, is better than to know 
something of everything. 
Vocal Music. —We hope our teachers will 
by no means neglect vocal music in their 
schools the comiDg winter. There is nothing 
which daily practice tends more to cultivate 
than a taste for music. And surely nothing 
can be more enrapturing than the charming 
sounds of the voice in singing. 
To leave your son a fortune—educate him. 
Useful (Slifi. 
THE SNOW FLAKE. 
Poets ani Philosophers have both expended 
a good deal of ink on the subject of snow, and 
it is a legitimate object for the investigations 
of the one, and the rhapsodies of the other. 
The lover says to his mistress— 
“I take this hand ; this hand 
As soft as dove’s down, and as white as it; 
Or Ethiopian’s tooth, or the finned snow, 
That’s bolted by the northern blasts twice o’er,” 
while the admirer of nature studies the snow¬ 
flake, and descants upon the beauties of its 
crystallization. 
There are a great variety of forms in the 
snow-flake, although nearly all of them, in 
some respects, resemble a star. The above 
figure, from Muller, shows a few of the flakes 
or crystals, all of which belong to the hexa¬ 
gonal system. They vary greatly in appear¬ 
ance, and would furnish good patterns for 
embroidery. Indeed, we believe most persons, 
observing the cut without the accompanying 
explanations, would refer it to the Ladies De¬ 
partment as figures for lace-work, much sooner 
than to the department of Natural Philosophy. 
The crystallization of liquids is a curious 
phenomenon, and the forms of beauty thus 
produced, are by no means limited to snow. 
The frost-work on the window pane surpasses 
all the works of art, and the salts, shooting 
into crystals under the microscope, have 
captivated many a young philosopher. 
Snow i3 a thing of infinite utility as well as 
beauty. Its non-conducting properties serve 
to retain the caloric of the earth, and prevent 
the frost from penetrating to a destructive 
depth. It wraps mother earth in its fleecy 
mantle, and cherishes within her bosom that 
spark of vital warmth which at the opening 
of spring starts the slumbering vegetation 
into renewed life. Without a depth of snow 
to protect the earth, many countries,. which 
now sustain a vigorous population, would 
forever remain regions of frost and desolation. 
THE ATMOSPHERE. 
Modern chemistry informs us that, though 
considered simple and elementary by the an¬ 
cients, air is a mixture of at least three elastic 
fluids, equally subtle and invisible, and equally 
essential to the purposes which the atmosphere 
is intended to serve. These are the now well 
known gases nitrogen, oxygen and carbonic 
acid. In the first, flame dies and no life can 
persist; in the second, bodies burn and ani¬ 
mals live with great intensity ; in the third, 
both life and flame are extinguished. Though 
so different in thdr properties when taken 
sirgly, the admixture of them, which forms 
our atmosphere, i3 adjusted—in kind and in 
the relative proportions of each—to the con¬ 
dition of things both living and dead, which 
now obtains on the surface of the earth. 
Did the air consist of nitrogen only, the 
sun’s rays would be the sole source of heat 
wherever the atmosphere extended, and no ex¬ 
isting plant or animal could flourish on the 
globe. Were it formed of oxygen only, fire 
once kindled, would refuse to be extinguished, 
and conflagration would spread till everything 
combustible in the earth was consumed. Did 
it consist of carbonic acid only, death and 
comparative stillness would reign everywhere, 
and the production of light and heat such as 
we can now command, would be utterly im¬ 
possible. But the happy mixture of the three 
gases which now prevails, renders everything 
possible. Under their united influence the 
rocks crumble to form a fertile soil, plants 
flourish to cover it with verdure, animals live 
to adorn and enjoy it, and light and heat are 
awakened or extinguished at will. The inact¬ 
ive nitrogen dilutes the too energetic oxygen, 
so as to make life longer, and to subject living 
fire to human control; while the poisonous 
carbonic acid is rendered harmless to animal 
life by the very small proportion in which it 
is mixed with the other airs. 
High Ground.— America is the only coun¬ 
try on earth that can possibly lay claim to 
the natural capital of the globe. The re¬ 
searches of Lieut. Maury have demonstrated 
that by wind and wave, it is down stream 
from our country to all the world ; and that 
all nations must ascend to reach it. With an 
ocean on either hand, its power descends with 
celerity to every country on the sphere ; and 
that, too, from even the deepest interior of the 
country. 
A ray of light to the understanding is bet¬ 
ter than a volume committed to memory. 
ANIMAL INSTINCT IN BED-MAKING. 
Study the form of a hare. In the flattest 
and most unpromising fields, the creature will 
have availed herself of some litttle hollow to 
the lee of an insignificant tuft of grass, and 
there she will have nestled and fidgeted about 
till she made a smooth, round, grassy bed, 
compact aDd fitted to her shape, where she 
may curl herself snugly up, and cower down 
below the level of the cutting night wind.— 
Follow her example : a man, as he lies down 
upon his mother earth, is but a small, low ob¬ 
ject, and a screen of eighteen inches high will 
guard him securely from the strength of a 
storm. 
The great-mistake of a novice lies in select¬ 
ing a tree for his camping place, whieh spreads 
out nobly above, but affords nothing but a 
barren stem below. It may be that as he 
walks about in search of a bush, the quantity 
of foliage at .the level of his eye, with its 
broad shadow, chiefly attracts him, and as he 
stands to the leeward of it, it seems snug; 
and, therefore, without further reflection, he 
orders hi3 bed to be spread at its foot. But 
as soon as he lies down on the ground, the 
tree proves worthless as a screen ; it is a roof, 
and not a wall; what is really wanted is a 
dense low screen, perfectly wind-tight, as high 
up as the knee above the ground. All addi¬ 
tional defence is superfluous to a sleeping man. 
Thus, if a traveler has to encamp on a bare 
turf plain, he need only-turn up a broad sod, 
seven feet loDg by two feet wide, and if he 
succeeds in propping it up on its edge, it will 
form a sufficient shield against the wind.— 
Gulton's Art of Travel. 
J _ 
THE FOOD OF THE ANCIENTS, 
The last number of the Revue des Deux 
Mondes, contains a curious passage on the 
food of the ancients. The common notion is 
that the ancients were much simpler in their 
dishes than we are—perhaps so, at least in 
earlier days—but, as we learn their viands 
were more various for, beside the domestic 
animals and the game eaten by us, they ate 
many animals we never think of touching, 
except in the last extremity. They did not 
disdain the hedgehog, the donkey, the cat, the 
dog, nor that horse flesh which, as onr school 
.geography used to tell us, “ is publicly sold 
in the markets of Norway,” and which 
Isidore Geoffroy Saint Hilaire has recently 
declared to be eminently nutritious; nay, what 
is more they considered deg flesh to be equal 
in nutritive value to chicken, and place the 
donkey on a par with the ox. Pork they 
considered the most indigestible of all and fit 
only for artisans and athletes. It would be 
difficult (says “ The Leader”) to persuade 
John Bull to dine on a sirloin of donkey, or 
to ask the waiter to bring him ribs of dog 
with fried toadstools, other mollusees, and 
shudder at the mention of snails. We eat 
mushrooms and truffles with gusto and believe 
all other fungi to be poisonous. Nor can 
famine itself displace our fears. Had the 
Greeks better digestions, or were their dog 3 
and donkeys more succulent than curs ? 
A Curiosity. —The Homestead spates that 
there is on the farm of C. R. AIsop, in Mid¬ 
dletown, a curious freak of nature in the shape 
of a tree. It stands among a number of mag¬ 
nificent sugar maples, has a trunk three feet in 
diameter, and to a casual observer presents 
nothing worthy of special notice. But on 
closer inspection it is discovered that one side 
of the tree is sugar maple and the other white 
oak. The body of the tree is round and 
smooth, and the junction of the two varieties 
is marked by a slight ridge in the bark, which 
would hardly be noticed. Some twelve feet 
from the ground, the tree divides ; one side is 
maple and the other oak. The maple throws 
out a branch that has been entirely surround¬ 
ed by the oak, and offers on that side the sin¬ 
gular appearance of a white oak tree throwing 
out a maple limb. It is very singular, and 
worth the ride from the city to see.— Hartford 
Times. 
Always laugh when you can — it is a cheap 
medicine. Mirthfulness is a philosophy not 
well understood. It i3 the sunny side of ex¬ 
istence. 
Hope, is like a bad clcck striking the hour 
of happiness, whether it has come or not. 
fct|’s Corner. 
usings. 
For Moore’s Rar&l Nevr-Yorker. 
GEOGRAPHICAL ENIGMA. 
I am composed of 14 letters. 
My 13, 11, 5, 9,10,6 is a celebrat:d peninsula. 
My 9, 14, 7 is a British isle. 
My 10, 1, 1, 2, 10 is a town in the U. S. 
My 7, 8, 4, 13, 6 is a river in Mexico. 
My 7, 6, 3, 4, 8, 2 is a German State. 
My whole is a desolate part of the new 
world. a. m. p. 
Cazenovia, N. Y. 
flP Answer next week. 
For the Rural New-Yorker, 
MATHEMATICAL QUESTION. 
Three boys possessed a quantity of apples 
unequally divided. One-half of the first, one- 
ninth of the second, and one-tenth of the 
third, equalled each other ; and one-twentieth 
of the first added to one-sixth of the second, 
and one-fifth of the third equalled 36. How 
many were there in all, and how many had 
each ? 
Answer next week. 
Answer to Miscellaneous Enigma in No. 302: 
United States. 
Answer to Mathematical Question in No. 302: 
The father’s age was 48 years ; son’s age 12. 
For the Baral New-Yorker. 
I LOVE THE SABBATH. 
“ Yss, child of suff’ring, thou may’st well he sure 
He, who ordained the Sabbath, loves the poor.” 
[ O. W. Holmes. 
I lore thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, 
For they are day.s of holy rest, 
And thou hast passed thy changeless word, 
That they shall be forever blest. 
I love thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, 
When congregations meet to praise 
Thy name ; when earnest prayer is heard 
In harmony with sacred lays. 
I love thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, 
That congregate Thy people here, 
To join their hearts in sweet accord, 
And fit them for a higher sphere. 
I love thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, 
When Christians meet to praise and pray, 
And trust Thy grace will me afford 
. A blessed, eternal Sabbath day. 
I love thine earthly Sabbaths Lord, 
That shadow forth the one to come, 
When all shall reap their just reward, 
And saints shall have in heaven a home. 
Then from eternity, adown, 
I’ll sing Thy praise where nought retards. 
And with the hosts of heaven, crown 
Thee “King of Kings and Lord of Lords.” 
Carmel, N. Y., Oct., 1855. 
CLERICAL ZEAL. 
Awhile ago, a party of British travelers, 
among whom there were no less than three 
prosperous clergymen of the Church of Eng¬ 
land, were making a long passage through 
the desert, from Cairo to Jerusalem. They 
followed on the track of the Israelites, as 
they believed, and on week days, they read, 
and consulted, and explored, and were full of 
interest about that sacred old history. On 
Sundays, they stopped, for at least half the 
day. On the first Sunday, one of the clergy¬ 
men preached a sermon, old, and wholly irrel- j 
evant—subtle, and yet superficial—abstract, j 
and yet anything but elevating. There was j 
not a word in the discourse, nor a tone in the 
preacher, which met the real desire of every 1 
heart present, for some reference to the place 
and circumstances in which they were. On j 
the next Sunday, the two other divines ex¬ 
cused themselves from preaching, on the 
ground that they had no sermons with them. 
“ Can’t you speak to us ?” asked one of the 
laity. “ In such a place a3 this, have yc-u 
nothing to say to us, that our hearts are 
thirsting to hear ?” The cold reply was, that 
extempore preaching is not allowed by the 
Church of England, and that it was impossi¬ 
ble to write a sermon in the desert. Yet this 
man wrote an ample journal; and the party 
were not a congregation, but a tent-full of 
comrades—a family, as it were, in the desert 
The former preacher read again the old ser¬ 
mon; and so he did, f.r the same reasons, 
on a third Sunday! 
The Convict Reprieved.— “ I once saw,” 
said the Rev. Dr. Innes, of Edinburgh, “ so 
much joy produced by the sense of deliverance, 
from a great dreaded evil, as may diminish onr 
surprise at the same effect resulting from the 
first discovery of pardoning mercy. In the 
town where I resided, reprieve was expected 
for a man under sentence of death. I request¬ 
ed the chief magistrate to let me know when 
it arrived, as I should like to be the first mes¬ 
senger of the goed news to the criminal. He 
did so. I went in and communicated to the 
poor man the glad tidiDgs. He instantly fell 
on his knees on the cold earthen floor of his 
dungeon, and, clasping his hands, and lifting 
up his eyes to heaven, while tears rushed down 
his cheeks, he prayed that the seven days of 
reprieve might be to him as seven thousand 
years of genuine turniug to God. This man 
afterwards received a pardon.” 
Christ and Christ Only.— He who will 
not believe in Christ must discover, if possible, 
some expedient to supply the need of his 
assistance. This neither you nor I can at¬ 
tempt ; we require one who can raise and 
support us while we live, and lay his hands 
under onr heads when we come to die. This 
He can do abundantly, according to what is 
written of Him; and we know none whom 
we can or ought to prefer. Never was love 
like His ; nor has anything so good and great 
as the Bible testifies of Him ever come into 
the heart of man ; it infinitely transcends his 
utmost desert. There is a holy form which 
rises for the poor pilgrim as a star in the 
night, and satisfies his inmost need, his most 
secret anticipations and wishes. ^ 
Rev. Samuel Wesley.— The Rev. Samuel 
Wesley, father of the celebrated John Wesley, 
being strongly importuned by the friends of 
James II., to support the measures of the 
Court in lavor of Popery, with promises of 
preferment, absolutely refused even to read 
the King’s declaration; and, although sur¬ 
rounded with courtiers, soldiers and inform¬ 
ers, he preached a bold and pointed discourse 
against it, from these words : “ If it be so, our 
God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us out 
of thine hand, O KiDg. But, if not, be it 
known unto thee, O King, that we will not 
serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image 
which thou hast set up.” 
Thy Will be Done.— The late Mr. Kilpin, 
of Exeter, writes, “ I knew a case in which 
the minister, praying over a child apparently 
dying, said, ‘ If it be thy will, spare—.’ The 
mother’s soul yearning for her beloved, ex¬ 
claimed. ‘ It must be his will! I cannot bear 
ifs.' The minister stopped. To the surprise 
of many the child recovered, and the mother, 
after almost suffering martyrdom by him while 
a stripling, lived to see him hanged before he 
was two and twenty! O ! it is good to say, 
Not my will, but thine be done.’ ” 
