early and ordinary habits of thinking and speaking, it forms so much a part of ourselves from the nursery upward, that it is extremely difficult to place it, so to speak, at a sufficient distance from the mind's eye to discern its nature, or to judge of its proportions. It is, besides, so uncompounded in its structure-so patch-work-like in its composition, so broken down into particles, so scanty in its inflections, and so simple in its fundamental rules of construction, that it is next to impossible to have a true grammatical notion of it, or to form indeed any correct ideas of grammar and philology at all, without being able to compare and contrast it with another language, and that other of a character essentially different."

Nothing has more contributed in this country to disparage the cause of classical education than the rendering it the education of all. That to many this education can be of little or no advantage, is a truth too manifest to be denied; and on this admission the sophism is natural, to convert "useless to many" into "useful to none." With us, the learned languages are at once taught too extensively, and not intensively enough; an absurdity in which we are now left almost alone in Europe. We may notice that the distinction of schools, to which, in the following passage, Mr. Pillans alludes, is not peculiar to Prussia, but has been long universal in the German and Scandinavian states: even Russia has adopted it.

"The strongest case against the advocates for classical education, is the practice that has hitherto prevailed of making it so general as to include boys of whom it is known beforehand that they are to engage in the ordinary pursuits of trade and commerce; who are not intended to prosecute their education farther than school, and are not therefore likely to follow out the subject of their previous studies much, or at all, beyond the period of their attendance there.

"I willingly allow, and have already admitted, that a youth who looks forward from the very outset to the practice of some mechanical or even purely scientific art, may employ his time better, in acquiring manual dexterity and mathematical knowledge, than in making himself imperfectly acquainted with a dead language. There must be in all very large and populous towns, a class of persons in tolerably easy circumstances, and whose daily business affords them considerable leisure, but who contemplate for their children nothing beyond such acquirements as shall enable them to follow out the gainful occupation, and move in the narrow circle, in which they themselves, and their fathers before them, have spent a quiet and inoffensive life. It was for youth of this sort that the Prussian government, with a sagacity and foresight characteristic of all its educational proceedings, provided what are called buerger and mittelschulen-intermediate steps between the volks-schulen, and primary schools, and the Gymnasia, or gelehrte-schulen; and the French have wisely followed the example of Prussia, by ordaining the establishment of écoles moyennes, called also écoles primaires supérieures, in all towns above a certain population."

From the specimens now adduced, the reader is enabled to form certainly a high, but by no means an adequate estimate of these lectures. To be properly appreciated, the whole reasoning must be studied in connection-which, we are confident, few, sincerely interested in the subject, will fail to do.

III.-ON THE PATRONAGE AND SUPERINTENDENCE

OF UNIVERSITIES.1

(APRIL, 1834.)

Report made to His Majesty, by a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the State of the Universities of Scotland. (Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed, 7th October, 1831.)

E

We have long had it in view to consider this Report, both with respect to what it contains, and to what it omits. At present we must limit ourselves to the latter head; and in particular shall endeavor to make up for its remarkable silence as to the systems of Academical Patronage in this country, their palpable defects, and the means of improvement. This, and the revision and formation of constitutions, were the only objects upon which its framers could have employed themselves beneficially; for it is of far more importance to secure good Teachers, than to make rules about Teaching; and it shall be our present endeavor to show in what way this primary end must be attained in principle, how it has been attained in other countries, and might be rendered attainable in our own. On a future occasion, we may perhaps make some observations on the more censurable parts of the Report with respect to Teaching and Academical Policy; meanwhile, we shall touch principally on the one capital omission now commemorated.

This omission, however singular it may appear, is not without excuse. During the ascendency of those principles of government under which the Commission was constituted, to have deprived public trustees of their office only for incompetence and self-seeking, would have been felt a far-reaching and a very [Omitted, some interpolations of little moment.]

1

dangerous precedent; and so long as the Great Corporation remained the pattern and the patron of corruption, to have attempted a reform of minor corporations would have been at once preposterous and unavailing. At the same time the theory of educational establishments is so little understood in this country, and so total an ignorance prevails in regard to what has been practically accomplished in foreign Universities, past and present, that the Commissioners are hardly to be blamed for any limited and erroneous views of the imperfections of our academical system, or of the measures to be adopted for its improvement. To the same cause is it to be attributed, that while all admit, in proportion to their intelligence, the defective patronage of our Universities, there are few who do not resign themselves to a comfortless despair of the possibility of any important melioration. Yet, this despair is itself the principal-indeed, the only obstacle to such a result. And to show that it is totally unfounded, that, in theory, the principles which regulate the right organization of academical patronage are few, simple, and self-evident, and that in practice, these have always proved successful, even when very rudely applied, is the purpose of the following observations. They pretend only to attract public attention to the subject; and fully convinced of the truth and expediency of our views, we regret that the exposition we can now afford them, is so inadequate to their paramount importance.

Universities are establishments founded and privileged by the State for public purposes: they accomplish these purposes through their Professors; and the right of choosing professors is a public Trust confided to an individual or body of men, solely to the end, that the persons best qualified for its duties, may be most certainly procured for the vacant chair.-Let us explicate this definition of academical patronage in detail.

I. In the first place, in regard to the nature of academical patronage:-That it is a trust conferred by, and to be administered solely for, the benefit of the public, no one, we are confident, will

1 Oxford and Cambridge are no exceptions. Inasmuch as they now accomplish nothing through their professors, they are no longer Universities; and this even by their own statutes.

2 The term Patron, as applied to those to whom the election of public functionaries is confided, is not unobjectionable; inasmuch as it comprehends both those who have at least a qualified right of property in the situations to which they nominate, and those who are purely trustees for the community. In the poverty of language, precision must, however, often bend to convenience.

be intrepid enough to deny. On the part of a University patron, such denial would be virtually an act of official suicide. Assuming, therefore, this as incontrovertible, it necessarily follows:

1o, That the reason of lodging this patronage in certain hands, was the belief held at the time by the public or its administra tors, that these were, under circumstances, the best qualified to work out the intention of the trust; consequently, if this belief, be subsequently found erroneous, or, if circumstances change, so as to render either these hands less competent to discharge the duty, or others more; then is the only reason gone for the longer continuance of the patronage in the original trustees, and it forthwith becomes the duty of the State to consign it anew to worthier depositaries.

2o, That the patronage is wisely deposited in proportion as the depositary is so circumstanced as to be kept ever conscious of his character of trustee, and made to appreciate highly the importance of his trust. Consequently, that organization is radically vicious, which conjoins in the same person, the trustee and the beneficiary; in other words, where the academical patron and professor are identical.

3°, That the patron has no claim to a continuance of his office, from the moment that the interest of the public demands its resumption, and transference to better hands.

II. In the second place, in regard to the end which academical patronage proposes-the surest appointment of the highest qualifications-it is evident that this implies two conditions in the patron-1°, The capacity of discovering such qualifications; and, 2°, The inclination to render such discovery effectual.

In regard to the former :-The capacity of discovering the highest qualifications is manifestly in proportion to the higher intelligence of the patron, and to the wider comprehension of his sphere of choice. The intelligence of the patron requires no comment. As to his sphere of choice, this may either be limited by circumstances over which he has no control, or it may be contracted, without external necessity, by his own incapacity or want of will. Religion, country, language, &c., may, on the one hand, by law, exclude from his consideration the worthiest objects of preference; and on the other, the advantages attached to the office in his gift, may not afford an adequate inducement to those whom he finds most deserving of his choice. For these a patron