of a brazier, or the art of musician; as if it were not necessary for one design to run through the education of them all, and for each individual to have the same bias given him; but as if they were all like passengers in a ship, who coming, each from a different employment and with a different intent, stand upon their common defence in time of danger, merely out of fear for themselves, or their property, and on other occasions are attentive only to their private ends."

Fisher Ames, indeed, in his essays upon the institutions, of Lycurgus supposes that the number, who received their education in the public schools, above described, constituted but a very small part of the whole Spartan youth, and that the rest went at large, like the youth of the other Grecian States with almost no instruction at all. But whether this theory be true or false is not important to my present purpose to determine.

No one, I think, who has examined those institutions, in connexion with the history of Sparta and the other cotemporary Grecian states, can doubt, that, it was by controlling more perfectly the education of the youth, some or all of them, he gave to her the distinctive national character, which she preserved for so long a time after him. Whether the Spartan or the Athenian character was the most perfect according to our notions of the perfection of national character, is quite another question. The Spartan Lawgiver made his nation what he wished it to be. He desired age to be respected at Sparta. He taught the youth this virtue; and age was respected there. He wished to banish luxury. He taught the youth to despise it; and luxury was unknown in Sparta. He wished to correct effeminacy. He taught the youth to value themselves for something else, to emulate each other in acts of hardship; and who could endure suffering like the Lacedemonians?

This overwhelming influence upon the character of a people, was not acquired and exercised, by giving to the young, now and then, a moral lecture upon the respect due to age, upon "the uselessness of luxury," or "the advantages of a healthy constitution ;" while all these good maxims were constantly contradicted, and their influence counteracted by every thing seen, and heard, and felt in the examples of those about them. The young were taught by all they saw to practice the virtues of the age, with

out being able to talk of their moral excellence, and perhaps without even knowing them by a name. Man was then imitative; and he is now imitative. He will, therefore, copy what he sees in the examples of others much sooner, than he will practice what he hears in their precepts. The abstract standard of excellence, too, with the ancients, was not so far removed from the concrete standard exhibited in the conduct of men, as it is in modern times; and, of course, the moral lessons founded upon, and drawn from that standard, were not so liable to be totally wasted, as similar ones are at the present day. Every thing around, which could be seized upon by the youthful mind as an example, was then in more perfect keeping, with what was taught them by precept. This circumstance will account, in some degree, for the greater influence, which the attention bestowed upon the education of the young seemed then to have, than the same attention seems now to have. The Spartan Lawgiver influenced his people by means of early education, more than his cotemporaries, only, because he controlled more perfectly all the associations of childhood and youth. He, and he alone, seemed thoroughly to understand, and skilfully to turn to his use, that principle of our nature, which has since been so happily described by Dugald Stewart. "Whoever" says he, has the regulation of the associations of another, from earliest infancy, is, to a great degree, the arbiter of his happiness."

But the associations of the young, in a country, like our own, cannot be so readily controlled as they could be with the ancients. What could with them be affected by the decree of a Lawgiver, must now be done by the slower, though not less powerful influence of public opinion. Where each individual constitutes a part of the sovereignty of the State, each one must of course be addressed, directly or indirectly, and convinced of the utility of public measures for improvement. When all this has been done, steps are taken affecting the interests of society, with as great firmness, and with as rational a hope of success, as if the process of making up the sovereign will were more summary.

I have referred to these instances of attention paid to early education among the ancients, not because I suppose that their institutions are at all suited to our times, or fit

to be adopted in our state of society; but in order to show by history and example-the safest teachers of human wisdom-the influence of early education, in a political point of view. Human nature, it is presumed, is not essentially changed since the empire of the Persians or the days of Lycurgus. And if the Spartan could mould and transform a nation to suit his own taste, by means of early education, why may not the same be done at the present day? The children of modern times are as helpless and as ignorant at birth as were the children of Sparta. If they have different characters when men, education has made them so. And it may make another generation as different from the present, as the present one is from the cruel though heroic Spartans. The silence of history upon the subject, leaves us to infer that they had five senses; and we, of a more enlightened age, have no more. The wide diversity in our characters, therefore, has been produced, by what those senses have let into our minds and hearts, and the various modifications of it, which different circumstances have made.

The education which we receive from the society in which we live, is partly beyond, and partly within our own control. The influence of it is much more important to us, than we commonly suppose. Indeed it makes up far the greater part of our characters in manhood. We begin to feel its power at birth, and continue to feel it till death. How, think you, would a christian teacher succeed in making a good christian character of a pupil, if that pupil were surrounded from its cradle by Mussulmen only, and saw and heard nothing, but what came from them, save the solitary lectures of his instructer? This view of the subject will enable us, in some degree, to estimate the extent of the influence of the education of example. Precepts never can, essentially, counteract the influence of examples; but the latter may and often do, as our daily observations teach us, counteract the influence of the former. It is not the instructions of the mother, though she next has the greatest influence, it is not the maxims of the schoolmaster, though he were as wise as Socrates, it is not the sermons and the exhortations of the pious minister, though he were a perfect saint, which form the character of the man in any country or in any age. The examples of the society, in which he grows up, these form his character, and make him what he is when matured in manhood.

If then it is by the power of the examples which we see, more than by the influence of any and of all other means together, that our characters are what they are in manhood; if it depends upon these, whether we become Pagan, Mahometan, or Christian; if it depends upon these, whether we grow up men of principle, or men without principle; men discharging all our duties to God, our neighbour, and ourselves, or men neglecting and despising them all; it would seem to be a matter of some consequence that the subject have a little consideration in this aspect of it. It ought to arrest the attention of every man, who is interested in the happiness of his fellow men, of every one who is interested in the character, condition, and prospects of his country, and above all, of every parent, who is interested in the formation of that character of his children, which is to abide by them here, and upon which depends their destiny hereafter.

Although we cannot control the examples which may be set before us, we may in a great degree, control those, which we set before others, who will never fail to follow them. And, if my readers will indulge me in a little more preaching, there is no responsibility, which rests upon us, as parents loving our children, as patriots loving our country, as philanthropists loving mankind, or as rational and immortal beings adoring our Creator, more solemn to us or important to society, than that of yielding our influence, whatever it may be, for the improvement and the advancement of the rising generation. Let the path of virtue be cleared of the asperities with which the ignorance and the wiles of men have obstructed it, and let it be illumined by the bright and steady example of all, whom children from their infancy most love and respect; and there need be no fear but it will be followed by many, who are now allured or driven from it. Though parents may look with occasional concern upon the gambols of their little ones by the side of the way, they may be assured that they will always be within call. And when the exuberance of their life and spirits have subsided and less embarrassed reason succeeds, they will be ready to take up the undeviating course of their fathers and turn as anxious an eye upon those who may come after them.

But he who has corrupted one youth whose examples will again corrupt other youths and so forward, the moral

taint spreading wider and wider at each remove from its original source, while society continues its organization, has inflicted an evil on an individual, which he can never repair; he has injured society in a manner, which he can never hope to remedy, though he should set over against it a whole life of good instructions; he has fixed a deep stain upon the character of the community, which he can never wipe out; and he has destroyed, as far as his influence could destroy, capacities for happiness, which emanate only from the goodness of God.

If such then be the influence of the state of society, in which we grow up, on our characters; and if such will be that of the society, which we constitute and must transmit to posterity, on their characters; it is important, that those, who contribute more than others to give a form to that society, whose larger acquirements and stronger powers, whether of good or evil, go far to stamp with glory or with infamy the character of their age, should consider well, whether they do not counteract, by the instruction of their example, what they take so much pains to inculcate, by their precepts. And if they do, though they should cheat posterity into a belief that they have been their greatest benefactors, they may rest assured that they have entailed upon them their greatest curses.