REVIEWS.

An Address delivered in Nashville, January 12, 1825, at the Inauguration of the President of Cumberland College. By Philip Lindsley, D. D. President of the College. Nashville, 1825, pp. 48.

IN calling the attention of our readers to this address, we should be happy to present them some account of the author, and of the institution over which he has been appointed to preside. Our information, however, enables us only to state that President Lindsley is a gentleman of experience in the art of education, who has filled, with good report, a professorship in the college at Princeton. From the address we learn that Cumberland College is an institution which has attained to considerable eminence under the masterly guidance of its distinguished founders, the indefatigable labors of its first most worthy instructers, and the faithful administration of its late lamented President:' that it is situated at Nashville, in West Tennessee, almost on the line which separates the healthy from the unhealthy portions of the great valley of the Mississippi, -as far south, probably, as it will ever be desirable to establish a seminary of the kind:' that, 'though a Christian, it is not a sectarian institution. Its immediate patrons and directors belong to several religious denominations. It is the property of no sect or party. It looks for support to the liberal of all persuasions, and is pledged to be equally friendly and indulgent to every class and description of citizens. No parent needs apprehend danger to the religious creed of his son, by any influence which shall here be exerted.'

Stopping here, to admire the catholicism of the plan which the above remarks describe, we may further premise that our want of knowledge in this case may be attended with the only advantage that ever accompanies ignorance: it precludes the possibility of prejudice for or against the publication we propose to review; and would force us, were we otherwise inclined, to speak with candor of the object which the author has in view, his sentiments concerning it, and the means which he suggests for carrying it into effect.

The occasion of this address led the author to select the subject of Education for his theme; and he very early makes known his opinion on the question' which has often been agitated, whether a public, be preferable to a private, education? Much,' says he, 'has been plausibly urged in behalf of each mode. The decision of mankind, however, has been pronounced in favor of a public system. Such was the award of Quinctilian, whose treatise on the

subject was among the most ancient which have escaped the ravages of time.'

In the mind of those, whose desire it is to discover, and bring into repute, that course of education, which shall most directly lead to the end of all useful instruction,-the perfection of man in all his powers and capacities for action and enjoyment on this side of eternity, and his simultaneous preparation for the employment which awaits him, when time shall be no longer,-the universal acquiescence in this decision and award, give additional weight to the inquiry, how can the acknowledged evils of a public education be avoided, and the advantages which the private system affords be combined with it? The views of President Lindsley tend to elucidate these points. We shall therefore extract freely from him, and content ourselves with performing the reviewer's humblest duty, that of furnishing "the necessary connecting links of narrative."

The grand aim of a college education,' says the address, 'besides the solid basis for a future superstructure, and besides the incidental advantages to which I have adverted, ought ever to be, to impart quickness in investigation and patience in research-to give the power of grappling with difficulties, accuracy of thought, and clearness of reasoning-to form the judgement-to refine the tasteto instil delicacy of feeling, and a vivid perception of poetical beauty and moral excellence-in a word, to develope faculty, and to subject it to such training and discipline as will ensure its future growth to manly vigor and maturity.'

Very different from this idea is that which young men usually entertain of what should be their 'grand aim,' while pursuing their collegiate studies; and very different also, from that which the friends of students usually frame, of what ought to be the result of four years' devotion to classical pursuits. The latter fancy that their son, or their friend, or their protege, ought to issue from 'within the massive walls of our ancient and venerated literary cloisters,' thoroughly informed on every subject that may possibly present itself to observation or to curiosity; and are grievously disappointed or chagrined, when they discover any deficiency or want of readiness on his part to discuss, explain, and clearly solve, every difficulty in matters of science or of fact. On the other hand, the student, aware of this expectation on the part of his acquaintance, feels himself compelled to acquire some knowledge on every subject that finds its way into his imagination, in order that he may be able to say a seeming good thing on every topic; and he is not long in learning that the task of laying up a few superficial notions, is not insuperably arduous, and that the display of now and then a pompous epithet, or an artful combination of un

meaning phrases, will pass current among too large a class of hearers, especially if they be, as in this case we suppose them, his admirers.

The consequences of this state of opinion, which we apprehend has been very general in our country, have been extensively injurious. It is a truth that we have produced few thorough scholars; that the number has been very small of those who have completed their public education, with minds disposed and prepared to continue a course of mental exertion; very few with whom the eclat of having been to college has not sufficed to content their ambition, and limit their efforts to add to their own literary attainments, or to aid in any amendment of the systems of education, that might promise to advance others more rapidly and surely in the way to useful knowledge. With those graduates who have entered the professions, classical literature and universal science have generally become forgotten objects; and, except as we have intimated, for the name, they might have as well commenced their professional studies immediately from the plough, or the shop, or the counting-house, as to have spent some five or six years in preparatory studies, so considered, which have benefitted them in nothing, unless it be in giving a familiarity with words, and the faculty of "running over" hundreds of pages in the least possible time.

If the evils of the opinion we are now alluding to, had stopt with the student and his friends, it might be less a subject of regret; but it has created a corresponding opinion in those who have had the direction of college studies; which is thus delineated in the address before us:

There is a fashion, already prevalent in some of our colleges, to attempt to teach their pupils every thing. To hurry them from book to book and from science to science-with such rapidity as rather to confuse the youthful mind by its variety, than to enrich it with its abundance. The rage often is to attend the greatest number of lectures, not to master the subjects of any-to hear and to see, rather than to study. We have only to cast an eye over the course prescribed in many institutions to be convinced that no more, at best, than a smattering of the whole can possibly be acquired. By aiming at impossibilities they do nothing as it should be done. The public is often imposed on by the rich bill of fare which is held forth. Parents, allured and deceived by a long list of hard terms which they do not understand, send their sons to seminaries which seem to promise most; without stopping to inquire, or being able to judge, whether the promise can be fulfilled. They would readily appreciate the absurdity of any pledge, from however respectable a source, to teach their sons some dozen or score of mechanical trades within the short space of four years.

'But there is a still more grievous evil attendant on this desultory system. A superficial course of reading, has an obvious tendency to engender vanity and self-sufficiency. Youth are fond of novelty and variety and rigid application to any apparently dry and difficult science or subject, is readily dispensed with, for the pleasures and eclat of universal knowledge. General reading becomes the order of the day-and those who read most, and can talk about the greatest number of books, bear away the palm from the dull plodding student, who may chance to find in Euclid or Demosthenes full employment for his time and faculties. Against such a fashion or such a system, and against any the least tendency towards it, I beg leave, once for all, to enter my solemn protest. It is ruinous to all scholarship-and never forms humble, modest, useful citizens.'

In making the above observations, Dr. Lindsley was not understood by his hearers to confine a college course within limits so narrow as to diminish its value or respectability, but only to inculcate more forcibly the position he appears to maintain, that greater practical advantage is to be expected from a rigid discipline of the mind, in the pursuit of a definite number of objects, than from a cursory attention to an infinite variety. Thus he says,

To a college course in general, and, at least, prospectively considered, no limits can be assigned. It may comprehend every branch of literature and science. But in reference to our present youth, with the qualifications just specified, it may be safely assumed, that the mathematics and ancient languages will furnish employment for the greater portion of their time, while they remain undergraduates. An accurate and profound acquaintance with these is essential to every individual who aspires to the reputation of a scholar. And neither time nor pains ought to be spared to ensure such proficiency to all our pupils. If these be not learned at school or college, the presumption is that they will never be learned at all. Whenever these are mastered, it will be comparatively easy for the inquisitive and studious youth to extend his researches and his acquisitions as far as he pleases. In this opinion all competent judges concur; although popular sentiment may, in some places, be opposed to it.'

And we are shortly after informed, by the following happy illustration, how he would have the mind, thus instructed, imbued with general knowledge by degrees, in such way as not to draw off its attention from more serious particular studies, and how it may be taught to make its solid acquirements subservient to the easy acquisition of the ornamental parts of a polite education. The paragraph we here quote gives us, by anticipation, an idea of the duties he afterwards more largely assigns to professors and tutors, and of the conduct he would have pupils observe towards them.

And few know how much a child or youth may be taught by a judicious system, which, while it keeps him steadily engaged in some great department of solid learning, is yet able to present such a variety, at proper intervals, as to keep the mind ever on the stretch and eager after knowledge. Let a parent make the experiment with his son of ten years old for a single week, and only during the hours which are not spent in the school. Let him make a companion of his child— converse with him familiarly-put to him questions-answer inquiries-communicate facts, the results of his reading or observationawaken his curiosity-explain difficulties, the meaning of terms and the reasons of things-and all this in an easy playful manner, without seeming to impose a task--and he will himself be astonished at the progress which will be made. So in a college, if, besides the regular daily routine of close and diligent application to severer studies, provision be made for easy access to any species of information at all times, much will be gathered, without in the least diminishing the amount of more solid attainments. The pupils will breathe a literary atmosphere. They will be encompassed with the means and incentives to every kind of mental effort. They will be in the midst of a learned society and every hint they receive may be improved. Books, lectures and experiments may be read, heard or witnessed-even on subjects which they cannot thoroughly investigate; from which, nevertheless, much that is useful may be acquired. It is worth while to know the elements--the extent and general nature of the sciences --and to form such an acquaintance with books, as to be able to estimate their intrinsic and relative value. Thus circumstanced, they will acquire liberal and enlarged views and feelings. Their horizon will be extended far beyond ordinary limits. They will direct their future endeavors towards a more elevated standard and rank of scholarship than they would otherwise have dreamt of.'

We have dwelt longer and extracted more copiously on this part of our subject, from a conviction that the grand cause of the inefficiency of our college educations, even in New England, has proceeded from the source which the address points out; and that the remedy consists in the correction of the erroneous opinions and expectations, which have for many years prevailed respecting the ends and objects of classical instruction. When young men shall understand that it is no recommendation, to talk swelling words, and make pretensions to what they know next to nothing of; and that it can be no disparagement, to reply to more than one of a thousand queries, that is one of the things which I do not know,— then we may see a reform within the walls of colleges, and a marked solidity of character take place of the vain show in which too many now walk.

Another and more novel subject, as connected with a college education, is introduced in the course of this address. The author