RetrofpeG of Domeftic Literature... Education. 
¥ownc’s Rofemount Cafile, Mifs Hunr- 
ER's Ella, or He's always in the Way; 
Toe Heir of Montague; Milfs PorTER’s 
Ofavia has fome tolerable verfes in it. 
The Arifiocrat 1s a ranting political novel; 
The Confeffions of a Beauty, from the 
French; and Gomer and Eleonora, tran{- 
lated from a Spanith manufcript, are both 
of them highly immoral and indecent. 
EDUCATION. 
Mifs Marta EpGEeworTH is al- 
ready known as the author of fome very 
fenfible Letters to Literary Ladies, and The 
Parent’s Afjifiant: the has now, in con- 
junction with her father, Mr. Sarde 
LoveLi_ EDGEWORTH, publithed, 
two quarto volumes, a fyitem of Pr pblical 
Education. It is obvioufly incompatible 
with our plan to afford our readers any 
thing like a fketch of this fyftem, which 
has nothing in it vifionary and theoretic, 
but, on the contrary, whick has for its 
foundation a feries of experiments made 
during the courfe of twenty years: we 
can only fay, in general terms, that the 
prefent 1s one of the moft liberal, {cientific, 
and practical plans of education that ever 
came under our notice; and we hold that 
perfon to be utterly inexcufable, who fhall 
undertake the conduét and education of 
youth without making himfelf acquainted 
with thefe voluines. In fpeaking with 
this unreferved commendation of Mits 
Edgeworth’s performance, however, it 
muft not be underftood that we affent in- 
dividually to every principle and opinion 
laid down in it: we.do not by any means; 
there are feveral againft which objeétions 
may be fairly urged, and there are fome 
from which we entirely diflent. Verum 
ubi plura nitent, baud ego paucis offendar 
maculis. The chapter on Servants ftrikes 
us as being by far the moft exceptionable 
“of any in the work: Mifs E. trembling 
that all the care and inftruétion which fhe 
beftows in order to rear up her children 
with ftriét religious notions of honour, in- 
‘tegrity, and truth, fhould be countreraéted 
by their communication with a fet of per- 
fons in whofe breafts thefe notions, thefe 
delicate fenfibilities, are mot very folicit- 
oufly cultivated, propcfes, not that cautious 
and reftriéted intercourfe which, indeed, 
we all of us acknowledge to be neccflary 
between fervants and children, but fhe pro- 
pofes a total feparation between the two, 
as being the only certain way of avoiding 
contamination. What! are not children 
fufiiciently quick in difcerning and in ex- 
ercifing their fuperiority over fervants 
without any afliftance on our pats? And 
@re not fervants fufficisntly fenfible .of 
Ae eae 
their inferior ftations in life, without any 
ungenerous mementos from us: Muft we 
bow them down fill nearer to the earth, 
and from the characters of fervants reduce 
them to that of flaves? What evils can 
arife from the intercourfe, we do not fay 
the familiarity, between fervants and child- 
ren, in any degree comparable to thofe 
which mutt obvioufly and aimoft inevitably 
refult from fuch a fupercilious leffen of 
ariftocracy as this is? May we be allowed 
to tranfcribe a palfage from Mr. Godwin’s 
Enquirer? it is admirably adapted to the 
prefent queftion: *¢ We are afraid of the 
improper leifons which our children fhould 
learn from our fervants; what fort of lef- 
fon ts 1t that we teach them, when we 
hold to them fuch language as this? It is 
a leflon of the molt infufferable infolence 
and magifterial ariflocracy, that it is pof- 
fible for any language to convey. We 
teach them, that they are themfelves a 
precious {pecies of creatures, that mut not 
be touched too rudely, and that they are 
fenced round and defended from the com- 
mon accidents of nature. We fhow thein 
other human creatures, upon whofe fore- 
head the fyftem of the univerfe has writ- 
ten the appellation of man, whcfe lgnbs 
outwardly feem to be formed in the fame 
mould, but upon whom we think proper 
to fix a brand, and attach a label with this 
infcription, Come uot near me! In the cx- 
uberance of our humanity, perhaps, we 
inform our children, that thefe creatures — 
are to be tenderly treated, that we muft 
neither fcratch nor bire them, and that, 
poifonous and degraded as they are, we 
muft rather foothe than aggravate their 
calamity. We may fhake our heads in ar- 
rogant compaflion of their lot; but we 
muft think of them as cf the puppy- -dog 
in the hall, who is not to be touched, bes 
caufe he has got the mange.” Whatever 
faults, however, there may be in Mifs 
Edgeworth’s fyftem, there are fo many 
excellencies in it, that, we repeat, no one 
who undertakes the education of youth 
fhould be unacquainted with its general 
principles. 
Mifs HANNAH More’s SirGiures on 
ibe modern Syfiem of female Education, is 
a work written with great powers of lan- 
euvage, and abounding in ‘admirable re- 
marks on the vitiated manners and fenti- 
ments of the times, efpeciaily among thote 
of higher ranks, to whom it is peculiarly 
addreffed. Jhat the females in this cla(s 
require a monitrefs of the fevere and rigo- 
rous ca{t of the lady who here takes them 
in hand, we are not difpofed todeny. To 
humble their venity by rid cule, and break 
aA 2 these 
