ment, but who have hearts, to say the least, as capable of emotion and sympathy as those of their richer neighbours. Great thanks, therefore, are owing to those who have laboured that this blessing should reach the poor cottage and schoolroom; great honour to them for believing, in spite of appearances, that Englishmen are not sentenced to a deprivation of it any more than Italians or Germans.

The comfort to you masters of that conviction must be great; there perhaps is no greater bond between you and your pupils except Christian Love itself, whereof it is one of the expressions, than the practice of this art along with them. But while it is indeed a mighty improvement, if music has begun to be cultivated in schools, where there had been nothing formerly but dry reading, spelling, writing, and ciphering, (an improvement which will soon be visible in the reading, spelling, writing, and ciphering themselves,) you will admit at once that this too deserves the name of growth, rather than of progress. Our oldest English schools made singing one of the first and most general requisites; the principle that it should be taught in some way has never been lost sight of at any time, though the practice may have been in some cases neglected through carelessness or despair; where it has been most revived, it is but the fulfilment of the notion which you have always maintained, that the School and the Church Education and Worship are closely related to each other.

In this lecture, I have touched only upon topics of encouragement. You will tell me, that if I knew your wants better, if I sympathized with you more, I should have dwelt longer upon the many circumstances, outward and inward, which are occurring every day to disappoint you and cast you down. Perhaps I may not be competent to deal with such causes of sadness in detail; but I think, I can imagine many of them, and I do know in general, that the life of a schoolmaster must, in the best days, and when there is least of accidental unnecessary annoyance, be one of toil and conflict—the life of a man, going forth weeping and bearing precious seed, rather than of one returning and bearing his sheaves with him. A day like that on which I am speaking,* is wanted by him more than by most men, to remind him that he should not wait for signs; and that if they are sometimes afforded, when he would be apt to lose all faith if he did not receive them, there is yet a higher blessing upon those who have not seen the effects of their labours and yet have believed. On such topics my temper of mind might have inclined me to dwell only too much, and to the exclusion of more cheerful thoughts, if I had not remembered that the great festival season is at hand, and that it commands us each in our separate circles to rejoice and to hope. When we try to obey that precept in our own families, many painful recollections may throng about us, many gloomy forebodings; when we try to connect it with our duties, visions of other men's sins, the more fearful reality of our own, will assuredly rise up before us. But this holiday occurs in winter, as if to remind us that its joy lies too deep to be killed or blighted by any chills,

* St. Thomas's day.

as if to give us a pledge, that seeds now covered with frost may one day bring forth the blade, the ear, the full corn in the ear. Let us then take sober comfort to-day from the past twelvemonth, and try to expect far better things for the next. Let me, with a full conviction that the words, though familiar, have a solemn meaning in them, heartily wish you, your families, and your scholars, a good Christmas, and a happy New Year.

CONTINENTAL WRITERS ON EDUCATION.

Essai sur l'Education du peuple, M. Wilm, publié à Strasbourg, Paris et Genève, 1 vol. 8vo.

Esquisse d'un Système complet d'Instruction et d'Education, T. Fritz, Strasbourg, Paris et Genève, 3 vol. 8vo.

THE isolated position of our native country, and its happy condition, enclosed and defended by the ocean's waves, are frequently subjects of congratulation to Englishmen of all ranks and ages. We are fond of attributing to this, among other circumstances, our long continued immunity from foreign invasion, and pique ourselves upon our nationality, and the sharpness of outline so frequently to be remarked in individual character, tracing it more or less to our fortunate separation from the continent and its inhabitants. It may be doubted, however, whether all the consequences of our geographical situation be advantageous; whether there may not be some danger of loss as well as of gain from it; whether, in short, there may not be a possibility arising from it, of our being left behind in the march of improvement which distinguishes the 19th century; whilst our more enterprising, or at least more enthusiastic neighbours, communicating to each other their various ideas, and stimulated by national and provincial rivalries, are at one time pressing on together in the praiseworthy endeavour to ameliorate the social condition of their fellow creatures; at another correcting defective or exaggerated views by the local experience of this or that particular district.

These reflections, in some degree perhaps humbling to our feelings as Englishmen, have been suggested by the perusal of a work placed in our hands by a contributor to this Journal,* and written by a professor at the royal college of Strasbourg, entitled "Esquisse d'un systeme complet d'instruction et d'éducation, et de leur histoire." Of which work, however, we would observe, before we speak more particularly about it, that it is only one of many remarkable publications on the same or similar subjects, which have proceeded from the pens of natives of this the chief town in Alsace. Indeed, Strasbourg itself may be considered in an intellectual point of view as one of the most interesting of

* Signing himself in the November number anodnμoç. We may here take the opportunity to correct an error of the press on that occasion in page 327, where the two last lines should be, "Geography makes known the form and productions of the earth, and the manners and institutions of the different nations who inhabit it, in their mutual relations to each other," and in the last word of the 2nd line of the 328, or following page, where " duty" should be "study."

all the French cities. By its position, a link as it were between France and Germany, it possesses many of the better characteristics of the two nations, serving, in the words of our author, as a bridge, across which healthy and original ideas are conveyed from one side of the Rhine to the other; and if we may judge from the few samples which have reached us within the last month, most honourably do its talented inhabitants acquit themselves of the obligation which their situation imposes on them.

It is, however, in its educational institutions, and in the works which have been lately written and published there, in furtherance of public instruction, that we feel ourselves more particularly interested. We are assured that there is at Strasbourg one of the best (if not the best) normal schools in France. There schoolmasters are trained during a three years' course of study under the direction of M. Vivien, the author of several books, remarkable for the high intelligence and christian spirit which pervades them. M. Wilm too, the Inspector of the Academy, and Professor of Philosophy, has lately re-published his essay on the education of the people, a work which has already received a medal of the 1st class from the government; and M. Fritz, Professor of Theology at the Reformed College at Strasbourg, more particularly merits notice, as it is on his history of education which forms the 3rd volume of his 66 Esquisse d'un systeme complet d'instruction et d'éducation," that we would, on the present occasion, offer a few remarks.

The two first volumes appeared in 1841, and were distinguished from a multitude of other works on the same subject, which issued about the same time from the French press, by the learning and research of the writer, no less than by the impartiality of his views, and the moderate tone in which he expressed them. In these pages, therefore, any one who wishes really to study the subject, will not only find much information, but the sources from which it is drawn being indicated, he well knows whither to have recourse for further details on any particular branch. They are, however, on this very account hardly so suited to the general reader as the third and last part, which contains, as we have already observed, the history of education itself, in all ages and countries of the world; and though we would by no means be supposed to agree in much that M. Fritz says on the state of education in this country and its dependencies, we cannot but conceive that many useful lessons may be learnt, even as regards our own theory and practice, from the views and comments of an intelligent foreigner, upon a question of such importance to all parties, whether political or religious.

To say, however, a few words on the manner in which the author has treated the subject, for there were according to our idea two ways in which the history before us might have been written. It would be possible to lay down, in the first instance, the true principles of education as they present themselves after due reflection to the mind of a serious deep thinking and christian man, such as M. Fritz appears from his work to be; then to have described and classified the methods which these principles have suggested, showing how both one and the other have been understood, and applied in different countries, and in different

times. Or the historian might confine himself to the facts of the case, giving an animated description of the several forms in which the desire for education has manifested itself in the course of ages among various nations, taking care to point out, as he proceeded, the motives and ideas which appeared to him to have actuated those who drew up the system of which he was speaking, as well as those who helped to carry them out. The first plan would be, perhaps, the most philosophical, and therefore best suited to the taste of those who make the art of teaching their particular study. The second would be likely to produce a book more agreeable to the generality of readers, and would also afford a wider field for the development of the author's talents and literary acquirements. It is accordingly this last plan that M. Fritz has preferred, and he presents us, as in a series of pictures, with the principles which have directed education in the different forms of its organization, from the earliest period down to the time we live in, placing before us, succinctly but clearly, a statistic account of the intellectual and moral condition of man in all ages and countries, as far as it can be ascertained with any thing like accuracy. Now after reading these accounts, few, we think, will rise from the perusal without perceiving how small the progress of education has been in this the nineteenth century, compared with the state of things in this respect among the antients. In the first place, the semibarbarism of some nations, even at the present day, whilst it deprives them of the blessings of instruction, is evidently a reproach, not only to themselves but also to their more enlightened neighbours, who refuse, or neglect to put out a hand to help them. Nor is gross ignorance the only thing which calls forth our regrets on this view of the subject; there is likewise a sort of vicious refinement still more productive of evil, inasmuch as it proceeds from a mistaken instruction, based upon no principles at all, or only upon those of political expediency.

Then again, it is impossible not to remark, that our author, in describing the systems of education in distant times or distant lands, has sometimes the intention of indirectly finding fault with much that is in vogue, even in certain countries which are supposed to take the lead amongst the most civilized in Europe. Wherever he has the opportunity, he points out the advantage of inculcating humility, deference to authority, submission of our own will to that of others (feelings too often considered superogatory in modern systems) as the very groundwork on which to form the future man and citizen. It is true, that M. Fritz seldom points out the inference he would have drawn in these respects, but it is difficult to believe that he had it not in view. His wish, perhaps, was to avoid giving offence, more particularly as regards his own nation, the French, who are more than commonly susceptible on such points, and who may equally profit by his observations, when they see things which are faulty at home, openly condemned in other people.

In certain parts of the work before us, there is much to interest even the general reader. Of this character is the description given of the mode of educating all ranks in the time of the Crusades, and again the very lively account of the precepts laid down in the middle ages, not only for the instruction, but for the correction of females. We refer to the "Chatiement des Dames, par Robert de Blois."

Abridgments, too, or at least extracts, from scarce or voluminous works of pædagogy, as the science is termed on the continent, give great variety to the pages of our author, at the same time that we may thence obtain a tolerably clear notion of the moral and educative principles which prevailed in the places and epochs in which the books themselves were written.

But it is time that we should draw these few remarks to a close. After what has been said of M. Fritz's History of Education, it will be readily perceived, that to attempt a complete analysis of it, would be to take away much of its interest, We prefer, therefore, to occupy the space that remains to us with a few extracts from the work itself; and we select them, not so much with a view of exciting curiosity, as in accordance with the principles on which this Journal is written, that we may suggest, by means of them, some useful reflections to the friends of education in this country, which they may turn to account hereafter in their own schools and families.

"Of our Lord's teaching, as developed in the four gospels."

Our author, after having mentioned the chief characteristics of our Lord's teaching, and pointed out that all that was said and done by Him, was subordinate to the main object; that of preparing man for a future state of existence in another and a better world, in which without holiness no one could see God; proceeds to make some observations on the form which he gave to his instructions, and we think that those teachers who are led to compare what is said, with the passages referred to, will hardly fail to draw some practical lessons from the remarks, as well as from the subject matter of which they treat. Let however, our readers judge for themselves.

"Our blessed Saviour," observes M. Fritz, "seems to have preferred the instructing by parables, and by the explanations and comments which followed thereupon, to any other mode of teaching. By parables he established, as it were, a connection between the common events of life and the sentiments which do, or should arise in the mind of every religious man who considers them. A parable differs from a fable in that the last speaks of things which never could have occurred in the way in which they are described to have happened; and we accordingly do not find that the Redeemer ever related any thing of this kind, although we know, from the 9th chapter of Judges and the 7th and following verses, that the Jews were by no means unacquainted with such a mode of instruction. But our Lord taught in parables, as the prophets also had done before him. See 2 Sam. chapter xii, where Nathan rebukes David, and Isaiah ch. v, where Israel is spoken of under the figure of a vineyard; for this is certainly the more elevated mode of the two, and the more suited to a people already acquainted with the first elements of religious knowledge. How simple, too, are the parables employed by our Saviour; how easy to understand, at least in their literal sense, and on that account how easily retained in the memory, although it will be perceived, that even as works of art they are perfect in their kind, omitting nothing which is necessary for their comprehension, whilst there is nothing added which might hinder the full effect intended from being produced on the mind of the hearer. Their divine author, however, does not confine himself to one particular form: at one time the whole parable is contained in a few verses, and in this case all details would have been superfluous; at another time amplification would seem desirable, and accordingly a fuller development is given to the relation. As an instance of the one, the reader is referred to St. Matthew, chapter xiii, and the 44th and 45th verses, where the kingdom of heaven is likened first to a treasure hid in a field, and then to a pearl of great price; and for an instance of the other kind of parable, to that of the two debtors in St. Matthew, chapter xviii, and of the householder in xxi chapter of the same evangelist."